


A House of Burden and Blood

by hannahyesss



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Bad Parenting, Black Family-centric (Harry Potter), Dysfunctional Family, Dysfunctional Relationships, Family, Friendship, Gen, Minor Original Character(s), Reconciliation, Sirius Black Raises Harry Potter, The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, Walburga Gets Sirius Out of Azkaban
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-24
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-16 17:21:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 39,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28960119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannahyesss/pseuds/hannahyesss
Summary: Lonely and starved of companionship, Walburga Black releases her son from Azkaban on a technicality that frees him but fails to clear his name, leaving him despised by the wizarding community. Walburga's plans for Sirius to return to his familial duties and marry a pureblood witch are foiled by his righteous insistence on reclaiming his innocence and raising the son of his deceased best friend.Essentially a Walburga-Gets-Sirius-Out-Of-Azkaban story with the added responsibility of a four-year-old.
Comments: 16
Kudos: 36





	1. Chapter 1

There was no one left at all except for Walburga Black herself.

A visit from her niece seldom occurred when Walburga desired it, and as time pressed from months into years between visits, she found that she rather loathed entertaining Narcissa Malfoy and that brat of hers. When Mr. Black passed away, quickly followed by their youngest son Regulus, the chats over tea were a balm to the misery of loneliness, but as the time went on, Walburga found that though Narcissa was sparkling with intelligence, their conversations were quite dull. What care did Walburga have for the social behaviors of wizards twenty or even thirty years younger than her? What did she care if Lucinda Pucey heard the most wicked thing about Ursula Greengrass’s affair with some politician? Gossip that once curled her lips into devilish smiles eventually turned to merely idle chatter that made her head ache as Narcissa’s son tried to play with precious heirlooms while Narcissa pretended not to notice.

Excuses to pardon herself from her niece’s visits limited their frequency, and more and more did Walburga discover she preferred the silence of the house and raging of her own thoughts to the frivolous chatter of Narcissa Malfoy. In fact, she came to realize that perhaps she disliked the company of anyone who wasn’t her sister-in-law Lucretia. Yet Lucretia had taken the death of her husband quite differently than Walburga had taken hers—for Lucretia, it was a sort of liberation, and the moment after Ignatius Prewett had been lowered into the ground, Lucretia whisked herself off to Paris and had been traveling the Continent ever since.

Walburga’s family had long evacuated the Black ancestral home to allow her to grieve, but none had returned. Her parents retreated to Normandy where the family still held a formidable chateau, while Arcturus only appeared from the house in Maidstone to berate Walburga on her failures as the Black matriarch and the failure of her sons to carry on the Black line.

More often than not, Walburga rose from bed and retired without uttering a word to anyone other than the elf. She hardly noticed Kreacher anymore, though she spoke to him constantly. Dutifully he stood at the sofa’s end, clutching a tea tray or towel, as she went on about anything that came to mind.

Walburga still managed the Black family accounts—a task that required clarity and soundness of mind—and only paused her sipping of whatever liqueur Kreacher had tipped into her tumbler to divide the Galleons owed to each Black descendent. There weren’t many left. Narcissa still received hers, as well as Walburga’s parents, Lucretia, and a handful of others including those who were imprisoned in Azkaban.

Each month, the task reminded Walburga how inefficiently her husband had dealt with the departure of their eldest son as she directed a hefty sum into the vault of the Black family heir. Never had the heir who abandoned the family accessed his inheritance, and Walburga rather considered it a waste to continue discarding gold for a person who would never use it. But that was the way things were done. Even Bellatrix continued to receive hers, though she would never use it either.

It was a Thursday morning in late September when Walburga was signing off on a considerable pile of Galleons to be deposited in her eldest son’s account. The nib on her quill snapped, splattering ink over the parchment. Her lip curled as she raised the ink with her wand from her son’s name.

For years she had performed the same task, scribbling his name and signing her approval of a deposit into his account, yet it sat differently that morning as she tried to recall the last time she had said it out loud.

The name was forbidden by her own proclamation. Nearly eight years ago, the coward fled in the dead of night, and since then, she had not allowed anyone to mention him.

Something strange happened as she stared at her own swooping handwriting, so delicately inked: _Sirius Black, Heir._ He was the last of the Ancient and Noble House of Black, a child intended to be the most well-bred wizard their family had ever produced. He was spirited and strong, and despite his unruliness, he was the embodiment of a Black as far as she knew. As a boy, he never wailed when he was denied what he wanted—unlike Narcissa’s boy who wept when told to sit down. Instead, her eldest son sought vengeance when he was wronged. While nothing irked Walburga more than undisciplined children, she and her husband were proud to raise a strong heir as long as they could hold their grip on him and steer him to channel his vengeance in a way that benefited the family.

To her fury, no matter how tightly they held to their heir, the further he slipped away. First, he had been sorted into the wrong house at school. His morals declined, and he declared his loyalty for the Muggle-loving fool Dumbledore. Walburga couldn’t recall how many Howlers she sent her old headmaster, demanding he place the Sorting Hat on Sirius’s head again. When that failed, she desperately tried to keep him away from those Potters on his holidays, sometimes even locking him in his room when he threatened to leave.

When it became clear that Sirius would never renounce his newfound values at their insistence, Walburga reasoned that she might accept that Sirius needed a little time to rebel. Hadn’t her father gone through something similar?

But Sirius was always needling her, always pushing away and pretending he had been switched at birth. He had done everything he could to enrage his parents by plastering the walls of his bedroom of Muggle contraptions and scantily-clad women, speaking about his plans to hunt down wizards who supported the Dark Lord, and suggesting that he had been intimate with girls of tainted bloodlines. By her husband’s urging not to engage with their errant son, Walburga spent the first month of the holiday biting her tongue and simply pretending that Sirius did not exist. To her satisfaction, it enraged the boy. However, in his desperation to garner her attention, he created new and cruel ways to get it.

She vaguely remembered the evening she snapped. Weeks of ignoring him had filled the well of fury as he held no hesitation of doing everything he could to spark a confrontation. Orion had seemed bored by it, but Walburga could no longer hold it in. Sirius had leapt from the table as Walburga charged after, screaming at him. Had she flung hexes at him as he fled? She couldn’t recall. She only remembered striking him, shaking him, and telling him he would never return to school. He would never see that Potter again, and he would be the disciplined heir that they intended him to be, even if she had to drug him into compliance until he fulfilled his duty. She locked his bedroom door, but she’d forgotten to confiscate his wand, and with that one mistake, she’d allowed him to escape. Orion had gone to fetch him back from the Potters, but he returned without an heir and never did not mention Sirius again.

Orion was gone now, however. Regulus too.

To Walburga’s chagrin, it was only her and Sirius left.

 _At least he had the decency to choose the right side in the end,_ she thought dully.

With a sinking feeling, she knew she didn’t believe it. Not only would it have been better if he had been free, but she might also have been able to convince him to come back to the family since his brother and father were dead. She might have even made empty promises that he could marry whatever pureblood girl he liked—perhaps one of those Waddington girls who had been Sorted into Hufflepuff. The Black was in his blood, and Blacks always chose familial loyalty. Sirius was no different from the rest of them.

The truth was, Dark Lords would rise and fall, but the Blacks would remain.

By the time she had finished tidying the accounts and taken afternoon tea, the errant son of hers refused to leave her thoughts. It was what he always wanted—to fester in her mind even when he wasn’t around. Desperately she tried to consider other things like what she ought to have Kreacher prepare for dinner or if she should write to Lucretia who was currently pursuing an affair with a young wizard in Barcelona, but her son continued to plague her.

How much longer would he survive in Azkaban? The Crouch boy had gone quickly, though she recalled him to be a weak boy—no match for Sirius or even Regulus. It occurred to her that she might outlive both of her sons, though it wouldn’t be unlike Sirius to stay alive just to spite her.

Why had Sirius chosen the Dark Lord in the end? Why hadn’t he returned to Grimmauld Place? Was it his intent to presume his duties once his loyalty was declared? Did he even care about his heritage when it came to serving the Dark Lord?

Walburga ruminated.

If Orion were there, he might have convinced her to let it go, that Sirius wasn’t worth the energy of her musings. But Orion _wasn’t_ there anymore. No one was there anymore, only Narcissa, and she might have preferred the sullen company of her disobedient son to the vapid gossip of a niece.

On a wild evening of too many spirits and uncontrolled musings, Walburga considered what it might take to visit her last son in his cage within the fortress of Azkaban. Gold and good connections would make it possible, but no amount of either would keep it secret. How shameful if someone who mattered were to discover that she had been to see the heir that she so vehemently denounced?

But as the night slipped into the house, almost imperceptible beyond the draperies cinched over the windows, the memory of her son’s face festered in her mind. Clutching the arm of a chair in one hand and a glass of port in the other, Walburga recalled the lesson her mother hammered into her soul: _“Family is first.”_

\--

The business of applications had been a bothersome thing that Walburga found insulting. The witch behind the bureau shrank as Walburga continued to offer more gold in exchange for approval, though the witch insisted it didn’t work that way. Walburga lost her temper. _Of course_ it worked that way. It _would always_ work that way.

While Walburga rose to her feet, thrusting a finger in the witch’s face, the witch gushed her apologies and went to fetch the department head. Walburga remained standing as Bartemius Crouch entered the cramped space.

He was always a persnickety fellow with a sharp formality that Walburga never cared for. Crouch and her husband had gotten on with stiff smiles and terse nods, yet Orion spoke his true feelings once Crouch and his wispy wife had left the party. Walburga did not like Barty Crouch and curled her lip when he arrived.

“Mrs. Black, I understand you are unsatisfied with the application process?”

“My family has supported this institution since its invention,” Walburga said, tilting her chin up. “It is unacceptable that I should not be allowed to visit my only son before he succumbs to his…situation.”

“I have on good authority that your son is in remarkable condition considering his circumstances,” said Crouch, though there was a rueful tone in his voice Walburga didn’t miss. “I see no reason why an application should be waived at this time, considering the prisoner in question is in one of our highest security cells. If you would allow Miss Ginsey to continue the interview, we will process your request in a timely manner and you will receive your answer within two to four months. Should that request—”

“Oh please, spare me,” snapped Walburga. “I am _well aware_ that I am not the only parent who has been to Azkaban seeking an audience with an imprisoned child. How dare you forbid me from doing what you allowed your wife to do?”

Crouch snatched the handle of the door and swung it shut. He was far too close for Walburga’s comfort. His eyes blazed.

“I have not denied permission for you to visit, only that you may not bypass the application to do so,” he said. “You may see your son _only if_ the department approves it. Berating my staff will do you no favors, madam.”

“And I wonder what you did to ensure an audience with your son?” said Walburga, narrowing her eyes. “What sort of bribe did you pull to achieve it? I thought it was derisive of your values to use your station for your own benefit.”

“I applied to see him just like anyone else—”

“Well, that isn’t what I heard,” said Walburga. “ _Someone_ mentioned that you blackmailed—”

Crouch scoffed, interrupting her. “The lies your crowd believes is astounding. If you will sit for this application, I will personally ensure that it is processed in the order that it is received. You are not the only applicant, after all, and there are those who have much more convincing reasons than you do, Mrs. Black, for visiting Azkaban. I do hope you believe me when I tell you that no one will take your word over mine regarding the circumstances of my last visit to my son.”

Walburga surveyed Crouch, her eyelids heavy with malice. Could he be right? Would the word of a businesslike Crouch supersede the voice of a member of the House of Black? Had the world changed so much that being a Ministry department head meant more than belonging to the wealthiest and most well-bred family in the country?

Of course, the name Crouch was nothing to overlook, but Walburga found it astounding how far the family had fallen. Bartemius Crouch was the last of his name, the last of one of the oldest pureblood families in Britain. Although he had married well (in terms of blood purity, naturally, as his wife had been a weak witch), Crouch cared more for the power of law and order than what his family name could give him. There was a time that Walburga had been certain he’d be named Minister for Magic. However, callously throwing his son into Azkaban after a sham of a trial had done him no favors, particularly in a pureblood society where family meant everything. Crouch had tried to wash the shame from his name, but in doing so, earned the scorn of his pureblood compatriots. What Walburga found so disgraceful about him had nothing to do with his hunger for power, only what he was willing to abandon in his pursuit of it.

However, Walburga saw a pitiable likeness between herself and Bartemius Crouch. While she had tried to hold onto her son too tightly when Crouch willingly estranged his own, they were both the last of their names. Both of their sons, like many of their kind, ended up in Azkaban for heinous crimes committed in the name of the Dark Lord, and in doing so, rendered their lines virtually extinct.

But as Walburga sized up Crouch, squaring her shoulders and glaring down at him, she realized that she would not be like Crouch. The Blacks would live on and produce more heirs until the family had hope for survival, even if she had to spend the last of the family gold to do it. Sirius Black would not waste away in Azkaban if she had anything to do with it. The Black name would live on.

“Bring the girl back,” Walburga demanded.

Crouch narrowed his eyes. “You will sit for the application?”

Walburga nodded stiffly. If she had to play by the rules to get what she wanted, she would. For now.

Crouch left, bidding her a professional farewell that dripped with contempt, and rigidly stepped out from the office. Walburga clasped her handbag, willing herself not to growl at his back. Isolation had made her slightly feral, and it was a challenge to return to that properly behaved witch she had been raised.

The young woman returned, nervously clenching her hands at her side as she retreated behind the desk and sat. She reached for her quill and smiled weakly.

“All right, Mrs. Black,” she said with a shaky voice, “where were we?”

\--

The waiting, at first, was miserable.

Word leached from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement into the wider realm of the Ministry that Walburga Black sought an audience with her disgraced, imprisoned son. She shouldn’t have been so surprised, but even Lucretia sent her a letter from Spain, peppering her with questions regarding her mental health and if perhaps she needed a holiday?

Arcturus Black, the patriarch of the family and Walburga’s surly father-in-law, called her through the Floo and bellowed at her for nearly an hour for her stupidity. To her relief, he was far too weak to travel and the worst he could do now was shout at her from the fireplace. Since he had shriveled from his imposing form to a hunchbacked old man, Walburga had lost most of her fear of him. He had not taken the death of his son and grandson delicately. Something—perhaps grief, maybe despair at the trajectory of the family line—broke him down from the intimidating head to what he really was: an old man in the final act of his life. Walburga took it, emotionless as she only half-listened to Arcturus’s insistence that she be evaluated at St. Mungo’s for mental soundness.

It was only a few weeks after the application had been submitted that Walburga discovered a visitor had come to call. Kreacher slinked into the drawing-room while Walburga was reading a dusty tome on wizarding law to announce that Mistress Narcissa had arrived.

Walburga’s lip curled. “Did she bring the brat?”

“No, Mistress,” Kreacher said.

“Very well, invite her in.”

Narcissa rarely appeared unannounced. The last time she had shown up at Grimmauld Place without an invitation was before Orion had died, and she’d come seeking advice. It was about something she couldn’t ask her own mother without shame—something only an aunt could properly answer.

Walburga folded her hands in her lap as Narcissa entered. Narcissa appeared as prim as ever, her hair shining in the lamplight as she gracefully descended upon the room.

“Oh, auntie, it’s so dark in here!” said Narcissa, waving her wand at the heavy curtains over the window. They flew open. Walburga ignored the fluttering of doxies, but Narcissa gasped. “That elf!” she cried. “When was the last time he cleared the drapes?”

Walburga shot a nasty look at Kreacher who miserably began to gush apologies. The elf had gotten lazy, she thought.

“I prefer it dark,” Walburga snapped. “The light is too hard on my eyes.”

Narcissa pretended not to hear and found her usual spot on the chaise. Kreacher offered her tea which she accepted without a glance down at him.

“You look well, auntie,” Narcissa started.

“Why are you here?” barked Walburga. The outburst made Narcissa blink, and the congenial look on her delicate face slipped into mild annoyance.

“I thought I might pay a visit to my favorite—”

Walburga harrumphed. “Spare me your pleasantries. Did Arcturus send you?”

Narcissa lowered her teacup from her lips. “Of course not.”

“Your husband?”

“I’m worried about you, auntie,” said Narcissa. There was something of Narcissa’s mother in the way she spoke with feigned concern. Her voice made the right intonations of worry but her eyes remained cold.

“Are you?” said Walburga dryly. “What concerns you?”

“Well, I heard that you’ve put in a request to see—to pay a visit to Azkaban.”

“To see my son,” supplied Walburga. “I see nothing concerning in that. After all, is it unusual for a mother to have an interest in how her son is faring?”

“But, auntie, if it were Regulus, I suppose I would understand, but…it isn’t Regulus in there.”

“I am well aware of that,” said Walburga.

“But don’t you suppose it appears a bit odd? If you need the company, I am more than happy to make our visits a weekly affair, you know. What sort of niece would I be if I let my poor aunt suffer in loneliness?” Narcissa stretched her daintily thin lips into a smile that failed to reach her eyes. “You needn’t disgrace yourself for companionship. I am here now, and I will be for as long as you need me.”

Walburga simmered. “Disgrace myself? You dare suggest motherly affection to be disgraceful?”

“Motherly affection?” Narcissa said.

“Do you believe me incapable of it?”

The doubt on Narcissa’s face suggested she didn’t believe Walburga possessed an ounce of motherly affection, though Walburga was too quietly furious to consider that perhaps Narcissa was right.

“No,” Narcissa answered evenly. “Yet, you might imagine how peculiar this all seems to everyone. It’s been three years, and you’ve not thought to visit until now. Since you were the one to disown him, you might understand how strange it appears that you would seek to visit him.”

Walburga cast a bemused look at her. “Disown him? What do you mean?”

Narcissa’s eyes flickered to the tapestry on the wall. It depicted the Black Family Tree, and where Sirius’s name used to be was a violent burn mark.

“When he ran away…” prompted Narcissa, now truly looking at Walburga as if she were mad.

“Sirius was never disowned,” Walburga stated. The shock on Narcissa’s face was nearly worth the entire visit. “He is still the heir.”

Narcissa nearly dropped her teacup. “ _What?”_

Walburga held back her smug, satisfied smile at Narcissa’s surprise.

She must have thought that her own son was next in line to be the heir of the Black fortune. If Walburga and Orion had truly disowned Sirius, Draco would have inherited all of the Black holdings once Arcturus and Walburga died. A strange series of events had prevented Orion from removing Sirius from the line of succession, and Walburga was suddenly thankful for each one of them because she couldn’t stand the idea of a Malfoy inheriting the legacy of the Black family.

Narcissa closed her mouth, likely realizing that she was gaping.

“W-why not?”

Walburga smirked. “Well, he is still my son, after all. Regretful decisions or not, he is still a Black. Did he not choose the right side in the end?”

Narcissa’s finger twitched. “Right side? Shame is the side he chose, auntie. The disgrace he brought on the Black name—it’s unforgivable. He should be disinherited for that alone! Why waste the title when he’ll die in Azkaban anyway?”

“That is rather impolite of you to say, Narcissa,” scolded Walburga. “Oh, don’t look at me like I’ve lost my mind. You’re only cross because you thought it would all go to Draco someday. Well, I’m afraid you’ll just have to wait a little longer.”

“Perhaps,” said Narcissa. “It _has_ been three years, after all. How much longer can he last?”

Yet Narcissa shifted uncomfortably. She, like Walburga and anyone who had known Sirius for more than a few minutes, would recognize the sheer stubbornness of her cousin. He would live on to spite them all. So delighted was Walburga at Narcissa’s discomfort that she ignored the insensitive referral to Sirius’s demise.

“How long, indeed? That is precisely why I’ve decided to see him one last time,” said Walburga. “It’s what any mother would do.”

\--

Christmas passed, though it was hardly regarded as an occasion anymore. Parties happened without Walburga, and gifts were exchanged between herself and Lucretia. Kreacher forgot the day, and Walburga had no desire to remind him. When the new year arrived, Walburga languished in bed.

January was a frozen, wet thing that kept Walburga drawn in her bedroom behind the dark curtains. She wasn’t very old, but winter aged her by decades each year. All she cared to do was sip tea beneath the covers and do the crossword from the _Daily Prophet._

When at long last, January broke into February, and with it came the tapping of an owl against the window. Kreacher fetched the letter and brought it to Walburga who managed to sit up only minutes earlier. However, when she spotted the Ministry seal and precise handwriting on the envelope, she shot up and snatched it from Kreacher’s fingers.

She shredded it open and read, her heart pounding. _Finally._

_Dear Mrs. Black,_

_Your request to visit your son, Sirius Black, in Azkaban prison has been processed. With great deliberation, we have decided to grant you permission for visitation. The next available date for passage to Azkaban is April 14 th. If this date is unacceptable, you are welcome to submit a new application. Please return your response with this owl and await further instructions._

Walburga’s mouth went dry. How enraged she might have been if they had declared her unallowed to visit, but suddenly, the prospect of seeing her estranged son struck a pulsing fear into her heart. Azkaban did not frighten her. It was Sirius who frightened her.

Or perhaps it wasn’t really Sirius—it was what Sirius brought out in her.

Nothing had been easy about Sirius. Even bringing him into the world was a disastrous affair, built on years of wondering if she were infertile to a pregnancy fraught with uncertainty. Had it not been for quick action from the healers at St. Mungo’s, he would have been born two months too early, and until he was born on precisely the day he was due, he had threatened to come at any time. Then there was the matter of the umbilical cord wrapping around his neck, nearly strangling him. After that, he refused to latch forcing Walburga to bottle feed him until he was weaned. Everything, from the day he had been born, was a struggle between mother and son.

The Ministry owl perched near the fire, warming its feathers. It glared down at Walburga, waiting for her to respond.

“Kreacher, fetch a quill and parchment,” she ordered.

\--

“Are you all right, Mrs. Black? You look a bit…green,” said the Auror, whose name Walburga had forgotten the moment it left his mouth when he introduced himself.

Walburga covered her mouth with a handkerchief as the Auror steadied her by the elbow and helped her off the little rotten boat. Choppy seas and a low tolerance for watercraft had brought nausea that she struggled to choke down. It kept her from snapping at the Auror for daring to touch her, though she couldn’t imagine herself keeping to her feet without his assistance.

“It isn’t too late to go back, you know,” he said kindly.

“It is for me,” Walburga said, straightening.

Fog swirled around the fortress, groping at the foundations and climbing into the hundreds of little black windows that pockmarked the walls. It towered over them as the Auror led her to the gate. Two Dementors flanked the door. Walburga had never seen one before, and she knew if the Auror’s Patronus had not been encircling them as they made their approach, she might have fallen to her knees in despair. She could still feel the touch of misery, though she couldn’t be certain if that was due to the presence of the Dementors or her own unease at the prospect of seeing her son.

There were human guards that greeted the Auror and nodded at Walburga as they passed. Their faces were wan and almost lifeless as if the Dementors had taken parts of their souls as well. Walburga looked away, focusing on the tear in the Auror’s robes.

The Auror’s Patronus was a sheepdog that pranced around them. Walburga followed it as it led them up the stone steps that led deeper into the fortress, all while she wrung her fingers together, deliberately ignoring prisoners who wailed and tried to reach for her. The Auror had warned her not to pay attention to a word any of them said and urged her to keep her eyes away from the cells.

Walburga knew it was likely her son had become one of the wraiths behind the bars, yet she could hardly imagine her handsome boy succumbing to such dreadful circumstances. He had always been so strong, but what would a place like this do to him?

They turned a corner where three Dementors lingered ominously. The Auror’s sheepdog Patronus leaped at them, and to Walburga’s relief, they scattered. She moved to continue on when she realized the Auror had paused before a cell.

“This is it,” he said, gesturing to the bars.

Walburga approached carefully, squinting into the dark cell. There wasn’t much to it. A platform made of stone bore a lumpy mattress and blanket ridden with holes, a bucket in the corner must have served as a lavatory, and a tiny window allowed a patch of cold light to illuminate the body on the floor.

“I’ll just be over there,” said the Auror, pointing though Walburga didn’t look.

When she felt the Auror had gone, Walburga merely stared at the body, unsure if she wanted it to move. Perhaps it would be better if he were dead, wouldn’t it?

Walburga sneered and jabbed a hand through the bars, seizing his shoulder.

“Get up,” she ordered.

The body jerked. A head appeared, hair overgrown and spilling over his eyes, but she caught his gaze, gleaming in the dark. He recoiled, tearing from her grip and shuffling to the other end of the cell.

“ _Mum?_ ” he blurted.

His shock mirrored Walburga’s own feelings. She beheld her eldest son with masked horror as he beheld her with wide-eyed dread. The handsome face that he inherited from his father had lost its youthful wholeness. Hollows darkened his cheeks and eyes.

“W-what are you—? Am I—? Are you real this time?” he sputtered. His voice came out as merely a hoarse whisper.

“This time?” she said. “Of course I’m real.”

“Why?” he asked. “Why are you here?”

Why, indeed? Walburga thought. It had taken months to get here, and despite the disapproval of everyone who still spoke to her, Walburga had persevered and done it. She had taken the boat across the sea and braved Dementors to come here, and still, she had no idea why.

Coolly, Walburga regarded her son. “Well, if you preferred I left—”

She turned her heel when she heard him scuffle forward. A hand clawed the end of her robes, and she looked down, oddly warmed by the desperation.

“Don’t!” he said when she made no move to stop. “Please don’t go.”

Walburga paused. His hand had nearly shriveled to the bone, reminding Walburga of Kreacher’s spindly fingers. He gripped her robes as if letting go would mean something terrible, and the motherly affection that no one believed her to possess made her heart flutter. A sigh left her as she returned to the bars. Sirius did not let go.

“You did this to yourself, I hope you know,” Walburga told him. “After all you put us through, I think you rather deserve it.”

Anger and hurt mingled on his face. Of course, she didn’t mean it, but he didn’t know that. She knelt, feeling the age of her bones as she lowered herself down, and reached through the bars to take him by the chin.

“Was it all worth it?” she said.

“Was what worth it?”

“Casting aside your entire family for this,” said Walburga.

Sirius let go of her robes and tried to take his chin from her hand, but she held fast. He looked away.

“That’s not what happened,” he said.

“What did the Dark Lord promise you that we couldn’t give you? That _Potter_ couldn’t give you?”

Sirius wrenched her fingers from his face. He rubbed the spot where she’d clutched, avoiding her gaze.

“It…wasn’t like that,” he told her.

“If you had come back, we would have forgiven you,” said Walburga. “A well-bred wizard is better suited to preserving blood purity by marriage than by throwing his life away for a Dark Lord.”

“I told you, that’s not what happened,” Sirius snapped. “I didn’t do any of it.”

Walburga scoffed. “I am not a fool. This may be the last time you see me and you choose to squander our last meeting with pointless lies?”

“I’m not lying,” he rasped. Then that strange, desperate look came over him again as if he realized he had been presented with a single chance to convince her, as if his life depended on it. He clasped the bars and brought himself close to her. She could smell the filth on him and wrinkled her nose, though he didn’t seem to notice. “I didn’t betray James,” he said. “I was framed—framed for all of it. I never killed those Muggles. It was—”

“Sirius Orion, if you expect me to sit here and listen to this nonsense—”

“Please, you’ve got to listen to me, I never served Voldemort. Mum, you know I wouldn’t—”

“And I never thought you would climb out of a window and run away in the middle of the night,” Walburga said. “I suppose I never really knew you at all.”

Walburga had not seen Sirius so close to tears since he before he had left for Hogwarts. Azkaban had stripped him of his fury and left him a miserable boy. It was all she could do not to look away from her once-strong, proud son who had been reduced to this. His eyes burned in the darkness, the only sign that her firstborn still lived.

“Why did you come here, then? If you hate me so much…”

Walburga nearly blurted that she didn’t hate him, yet she couldn’t grant him the satisfaction.

“I came to say farewell,” she said simply. “I was informed that your health was in decline, and I decided that it was only right that I come to say a final goodbye. I wasn’t invited to your trial, after all, as I imagine it was a closed affair, so I was unable to bid my farewell then.”

Sirius frowned. “There was never a trial,” he said. “Crouch convicted me without one. You didn’t know?”

Walburga stared. “You must be mistaken. You must have forgotten. They couldn’t throw a _Black_ into Azkaban without the courtesy of a trial. It is shameful to consider. They wouldn’t dare insult our family that way…”

Yet as she beheld the stony expression on his face, she bristled, realizing that Sirius was telling the truth. Crouch, the damned hypocrite, had withheld _her son_ a trial? How dare he convict a Black without a jury?

Sirius grunted. “Not like I wanted one of those sham trials anyway,” he said.

“This is an outrage,” she hissed. “How dare that _Crouch_ insult us like this? If your father were alive, this never would have happened.”

“It’s not something you can throw gold at,” he said scornfully. “Besides, it wouldn’t have mattered. No one would’ve listened to me anyway. Not even Dumbledore came to my defense when I was convicted.”

“That old fool,” sneered Walburga.

Sirius glared but said nothing. That was a peculiar change. The last time she insulted Dumbledore in front of him, he’d drawn his wand and threatened her. For him to keep his mouth shut at the unfavorable mention of the old headmaster was quite strange indeed.

“Well,” said Walburga. “We’ll simply have to right what has been wronged. Our solicitor Mr. Scrivens will declare a miscarriage of justice and have the conviction overturned. You’ll return home and resume your duties as heir.”

Sirius looked annoyed. “It doesn’t work like that—”

“Of course it works like that,” Walburga said. “Once I tell your grandfather what’s happened, he will persuade the Wizengamot to vote in your favor, and all will be forgiven. Don’t you _want_ to be freed?”

“He hates me,” said Sirius. “He probably prefers me in here than anywhere else.”

“Well, there is a certain predictability about you in here that is lost when you’re free to do as you wish.”

A muscle in his jaw twitched. “So if I were to be freed, you’d do as you threatened? Drug me and keep me at Grimmauld Place to be your obedient heir?”

“If it came to that,” she said. “Of course, you would never know.”

“I’d rather stay here.”

“Don’t be an imbecile,” she said. “But it isn’t really your decision, is it? No, your mind has been addled by your time here, and it’s obvious you would require a stable environment and a chaperone if you were to be released. Leave it to me, this will all be taken care of.”

“I don’t want it like this!” he hissed.

“Want what?”

Sirius clenched his hands over the bars. “I’m innocent. I don’t want to be free if everyone still believes I did it. I never betrayed James, I never killed Peter or those Muggles—”

“Oh, who cares what everyone thinks of you?” Walburga snapped. “You’ve never cared before. Would you prefer to rot here than be free?”

Sirius shut his mouth, and Walburga smiled grimly.

“Leave it to me,” she said. “I can’t promise it will be quick, but you will be free. Mark my words, Crouch will rue the hour he convicted you, I swear it.”


	2. Chapter 2

Sirius did not know how much time passed or how his mother would make it work, but he could feel time slipping away and with it, his hope that she would pull it off.

But it wasn't hope, not really. He knew because even with the Dementor hanging around outside the cell, he could feel the anticipation…or dread, rather. Well, whatever it was began to fade as he started to forget his mother had been to see him.

He couldn't imagine what was worse—wasting away in Azkaban for a crime he didn't commit and or shackled to his childhood home under his mother's control. What would she force him to do? If she kept him from a wand, there was little he could do to escape Grimmauld Place with its copious amounts of locked doors and wards. She could poison his food like she once promised and drug him into submission. She could dose him with a love potion and force him to marry some pureblood witch.

Sirius shuddered.

He eyed the wooden spoon buried in grayish porridge. Once he had thought to splinter it and stab himself, but that was a couple of years ago, and he refused to succumb to that sort of desperation again.

He cast the bowl aside. He didn't feel like eating.

As porridge slopped over the side, onto the floor, he wrinkled his nose. Was that how the others started their decline? Simply refusing one meal? He'd seen it too many times, the other prisoners screaming through the night and into the morning until finally they stopped eating and a few weeks later, the Dementors would come to bury the body.

Sirius lowered his brow to his knees. Maybe it was better that way. Why was he prolonging his suffering to avoid the inevitable? Eventually, his body would fail and he would die like everyone else. It was stupid to put it off.

Night slipped into cold dawn, though his cell hardly brightened with the fog clogging the air outside, and still his bowl sat full. He eyed it reproachfully until he grunted and reached for it. Eating held none of the pleasure it used to. When he was finished, he wobbled to the mattress and collapsed. His eyes slid shut as sleep offered a momentary respite from misery, and he slipped into the warm oblivion.

It was not to be.

Someone was clanking on the bars. Sirius groaned and pulled the threadbare blanket over his head. Then there was the sound of a lock turning and the screech of the iron door. The blanket was wrenched from him.

"Wake up, Black."

Sirius turned a bleary eye to the guard. Then he jerked up in surprise to find that there were two of them and a handful of Aurors.

"What's going on?" He could hardly force his voice to be more than a whisper.

No one seemed to want to tell him, and it occurred to Sirius that perhaps his mother's meddling had the opposite effect, and suddenly, he scrambled to the back of the cell. Were they here to deliver the Dementor's Kiss under the authorization of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement?

"He's not going to make this easy," one of the Aurors, a middle-aged witch with cropped brown hair, muttered to the Auror beside her. Sirius's gaze flickered to the Auror he knew was Gawain Robards. Alastor Moody had never liked Robards, but then again, he didn't like anyone.

"Make what easy?" ventured Sirius.

"If you'd like to stay, just say so," said the only witch.

"What d'you mean?"

Robards rolled his eyes. "Just take him. If he's not released, we'll be facing an inquiry. As much as we all would prefer him to stay here, none of us have a choice in the matter. Come on, Black, we're leaving."

Leaving? Then…perhaps it had worked after all. His mother had done what she promised.

Numbly, Sirius stumbled forward. Had it not been for two pairs of arms holding him upright, he might have fallen, but instead, they half-dragged him from the cell. His feeble steps were too slow for them, and his toes dragged against the flagstones.

Dementors loomed as they passed, their power dimmed by the Patronuses of the Aurors. Sirius, however, could feel the rage of the Dementors at having a prisoner relinquished from their hold. He imagined if there were no Patronuses guarding them, a clawed hand might have snatched Sirius right back.

Sirius couldn't help looking into the blackened cells and catching the eyes of each prisoner who watched them go. Some howled that they were innocent too, though most of them simply stared. One caught Robards by the end of his robes and with cold apathy, he wrenched the end of them away and the prisoner shrank back into his cell.

The corridor halted at the stairwell. Down they went, and Sirius felt his head rattle with each step. His bones jangled as every stone stair collided with his bare feet. He could hardly feel them anymore, and vaguely he wondered if they would fall off.

When at last they reached the base of the fortress, Sirius was feeling more confident about being upright. He jerked his arm out of the Aurors' hold.

"I can walk, thanks," he said.

No one touched him until the fortress doors creaked open. Sirius crossed the threshold, trembling as he beheld the North Sea crashing against the rocky shoreline. A dinghy bobbed at the dock. The same sort of boat had carried him here more than three years ago.

Sirius clambered into the boat, feeling an overwhelming dread as the Aurors packed into the little vessel. Would his mother be on the other side to take him back to Grimmauld Place? As they cast off from the island, he eyed the choppy waves. Would it be illegal if he jumped into the waves and let them carry him to shore?

"I wouldn't," said the witch, following his gaze. "Though I guess you'd be doing us all a favor if you drowned."

"Quiet, Proudfoot," muttered Robards.

Sirius turned his gaze to the other Auror, a tough-looking fellow with sharp eyes and a stiff jaw. No one seemed particularly pleased that Sirius had been released—no apology, no piteous glances. With a roll of his stomach, he knew that his mother may have procured his freedom, but she hadn't proved his innocence. It was a sickening realization that he was probably the most hated person in the country, for not only had he supposedly committed heinous, despicable crimes, but his family's gold had also set him free.

Once again, the churning waters appealed to him.

"Are you going to be sick?" said Proudfoot.

Sirius hardly made to the edge of the boat before he emptied his stomach over the side. The Aurors didn't move as he went on heaving, and the boat continued to lurch over waves, doing nothing for his nausea. When at last he had nothing left to purge, he sat back, wiping his mouth with the dirty sleeve of his prison robes.

He couldn't remember the journey taking so long last time, but perhaps he had wished it go on back then. Anything to have one more moment before they delivered him into his cell. Finally, the journey, like three years earlier, came to an end at a wooden dock, snug against a pebble beach.

Sirius hauled himself from the boat. To his great relief, his mother was nowhere in sight. Once his bare feet pressed against the wooden planks, however, Robards directed his attention to a Muggle soda can that had been left on the dock.

"Portkey," said Robards, nodding to it.

"To where?" said Sirius. He eyed it warily.

"St. Mungo's. You're to do a psychological evaluation."

Sirius shrugged. Perhaps if they deemed him completely insane, they might make him stay in the psychiatric ward—it was a better prison than Grimmauld Place or Azkaban, anyway, and the chance of escape was much better than either.

"And after that?" he wondered.

They didn't seem to know either. Robards nudged him forward, but Sirius didn't need the urging. He reached for the soda can, and the second his fingers brushed the aluminum side, there was a jerk behind his navel and suddenly, he was gone.

Sirius was feeling rather pink and raw as he sat, scribbling his answers at the little table in his room.

The moment he had landed in the ward, nurses had seized him and escorted him to a clean room where they stripped him of his putrid prison garb and shoved him into a bath. There was nothing gentle in their furious scrubbing as they chipped away three years' worth of grime. Scabs reopened under their sponges, though his mild complaints did nothing to ease their fervor. What they must have thought of him—he couldn't imagine if he'd been assigned this task that he'd be any gentler.

He was shoved into a chair after he'd been blasted with a fiery hot drying spell, and a pair of shears snipped away at his matted hair. He sat very still as a razor scraped the pitiful little beard that had grown. When at last they seemed satisfied, they left him alone to change from the dressing gown into the robes he'd seen other patients wearing when he came in.

It was uncomfortably quiet once they'd gone. There were plenty of voices outside of his door, but none were howling in misery. He could hear himself inhale and exhale. To his left was a window which he drifted towards, drawn by the glint of the sun peeking through a veil of dark clouds. How long had it been since he last saw blue sky? The sun? He felt stupid for staring at the way it gleamed over rooftops.

Somehow, the world had gone on without him in it, and nothing prepared him for the ordinariness. The Muggle world below still had cars and people going places. People had lived their lives while his had frozen in that fortress. For three years, his entire world had been a cell with a bucket and a blanket, and suddenly, he felt ill at the prospect of what would happen next.

Eventually, there was a knock on the door, and into the room entered a Mediwitch who couldn't have been much older than him. Sirius turned from the window and offered a weak smile, though it didn't have the effect it used to. She pressed her lips together and pointed at the table.

"Sit there, please, Mr. Black," she said.

Sirius moved silently, his smile fading. Once he had withdrawn the chair and eased into it, the witch placed before him a thick stack of papers and a dull pencil. She tapped it the papers.

"You're to fill this out. All of it."

"Is this the evaluation?"

She nodded.

"I thought it'd be an oral test," he said mildly, picking up the pencil.

"Well, it's not," she replied.

"When do I get to eat?"

The Mediwitch frowned at him. "Weren't you fed when they brought you in?"

Sirius shook his head, and the witch made a disgruntled hum.

"Well, you were supposed to," she said. "I'll have something brought in while you work. You're to eat slowly. The last thing we want is you making yourself worse by throwing it all up." Then she eyed him, wrinkling her nose. "They did a terrible job on your hair."

"Probably on purpose," he muttered.

The Mediwitch shrugged. "Perhaps. I'm Healer Honeycutt, by the way."

"Nice to meet you," he said, though he was certain she didn't feel the same way.

"Finish the assessment and I'll be by to collect them this evening. Do not leave anything unanswered or I'll make you do the whole thing over."

It was a formidable threat, he realized once she'd gone. Not only was it at least thirty pages, a dozen questions on each, but there were also a considerable number of questions that required actual writing. Sirius shoved the pencil into his hand, moving his fingers around the instrument and trying to remember how to make it go. By the end of the first page, his hand cramped, and with dread, he knew that the rest would not be easy. He'd flown through exams in school, but now he could hardly get himself to write a sentence or two before the muscles spasmed and he was forced to take a break.

A witch came to deliver a tray of food which included a half-collapsed pot pie and a small bowl of fruit. She dropped it all before him with a scathing look before she spun and slammed the door behind her. Sirius ate with one hand and scribbled with the other, impressing himself with his old skill of _multitasking_. Remus used to chastise him for it, usually with some sort of reminder that Sirius _could've_ done his work the day before instead of tinkering with the Map all weekend and waiting until Monday morning to do it at breakfast.

Sirius felt the food turn to ash in his mouth. He hadn't thought of Remus in ages. What would Moony think of him now? In Remus's eyes, Sirius was responsible for the death of his closest friends and now he had been released due to carelessness of justice.

 _Not now, finish the evaluation,_ he told himself. If he descended into that hole, he feared he would never be able to climb back out.

It took hours, but finally, he reached the final question just as Healer Honeycutt burst into the room. She swept in, snatched the stack of papers from beneath his hand, and flipped through them. Following a terse nod of satisfaction, she turned on her heel and went to leave.

"Wait a minute," he said, rising.

He saw her hand feel for the wand in her pocket, and ruefully, he wondered if he'd ever be allowed one again. She sized him up, clutching the stack.

"What?" she snapped. "I'm a bit busy. You're not my only patient, you know."

"It's just…do you know what's going to happen to me?"

Honeycutt raised her eyebrows. "These should help determine that."

"And if I pass?"

"It's not a pass or fail," she said. "Depending on how you've answered, I may decide to keep you here for rehabilitation, or if I think it appropriate, I will discharge you. If I do discharge you, I will likely prescribe ongoing therapy."

"I mean, will I be…free?"

"I suppose that depends on your definition of freedom, doesn't it?" she said. "I understand your mother is very interested in a particular diagnosis that will keep you in her custody."

Sirius shuddered. "I'll bet she is."

Honeycutt simply pressed her lips into a straight line and shrugged again. "I'll determine the best course for you. I made an oath as a healer to treat my patients without bias. If I find that it is most beneficial to you to send you off with your mother, then that is what I'll do. Does that sound fair?"

"Only if you promise not to let her bribe you," he said darkly.

Honeycutt smiled and retreated from the room, leaving him feeling ill at ease.

The next two days passed with excruciating boredom while Honeycutt surveyed his test, and he was forced to wait in his room. It was twice as big as his cell in Azkaban, and there were clean sheets and a decent window where he could watch the Muggles below, but he was so bored from the monotony that he considered crawling out of his window. He'd tested the doors—locked, and he later discovered that the window was charmed shut too.

Politely he asked for a newspaper—a request clearly forgotten the moment a nurse would leave his room. He imagined Honeycutt would've thrown him a bone and at least given him something to do, but he hadn't seen her in days. Maybe she'd forgotten about him. Maybe they would leave him locked up in St. Mungo's and he really would go mad.

By the third day, however, Healer Honeycutt reappeared.

"Well," she said, observing her clipboard. "A bit surprising, to be honest, but I've decided that you're stable enough for release. Before you ask, I do not recommend your mother as a caretaker, and I believe you perfectly capable of making your own decisions."

Sirius's jaw dropped. While he knew he hadn't gone mad in Azkaban, such a conclusion shocked him. Perhaps _Honeycutt_ was mad—what sort of person determined that a man who murdered thirteen people ought to be allowed to walk free?

"However," she cut in, "I still believe your traumatic experience should be monitored. I'll make an official recommendation for you to visit a counselor weekly."

Sirius let out the breath he'd been holding. "So I can go?"

"Yes, but I understand Bartemius Crouch is awaiting your release," she said. "I've been told you aren't allowed to leave without an Auror escort."

Not free yet, then.

Honeycutt waved her wand and upon the bed appeared a stack of clothing and a pair of leather shoes. She nodded to it, saying, "Your mother sent these for you to wear. She insisted you not be seen in _rags_." The voice Honeycutt put on sounded startlingly like his mother. He regarded the stack with a curled lip, to which Honeycutt shrugged. "Do what you like. I don't think we want the robes you're wearing back anyway."

He started tugging his robes over his head, not caring that Honeycutt hadn't left yet. He didn't care anymore. No one saw him as a person anyway. "Anything else?" he prompted, going for the clean robes. At least his mother had picked a set of midnight blue robes over green. She must have actually wanted him to wear them.

"I don't think so," said Honeycutt.

Sirius slipped into the robes, ducking his head through the neck hole. When he was buttoning the front, he cocked his head at her.

"I know you're not sticking around for my good looks," he said.

Honeycutt shook her head as if to shake herself out of her reverie. She blinked at him. "No, I'm not. The Aurors will come to collect you. Goodbye, then." She left, letting the door swing shut behind her.

It was no more than ten minutes later that Proudfoot and Robards wrenched opened the door and escorted him from the room. They nearly dragged him from the ward, until Sirius yanked his arms from them.

"Am I free or not?" he snarled.

"Then keep up," Proudfoot snapped.

The next few hours were a miserable lesson on what it was like to be universally despised. There didn't seem to be a single person in St. Mungo's who didn't know who he was, and the weight of hateful glares followed him, heating the back of his neck as the Aurors marched him to the Floo. It wasn't any better in the entrance of the Ministry either.

Hissing and shouts greeted them when he stepped out from the Floo. Sirius averted his eyes from the Ministry workers who must have known they were bringing him by this morning. People spat at him as Robards tried to shoo them away. He steered Sirius by the shoulder. The roar of outrage followed them into the elevators, still audible when the doors closed.

Robards and Proudfoot offered no apologies or doleful expressions. A rancid little smile pricked at Proudfoot's lips as she stared forward, deliberately avoiding Sirius's gaze.

"I hope Mummy's little trick was worth it," she muttered.

"Shut up, Proudfoot," said Robards.

Sirius had only visited the Department of Magical Law Enforcement a handful of times. Once, when he was curious about joining the Auror program (something he decided he might pursue after the war when his Order of the Phoenix days came to a close). Another time he'd stopped by to visit Marlene McKinnon who _had_ done the program. They'd gone on a few dates, nothing serious, but it wasn't long after that she and her entire family had been murdered by Voldemort.

There were Aurors outside of their office, lingering to watch Robards and Proudfoot show him to Crouch's desk. Sirius recognized a few faces, though not with the amount of malice that reddened their faces and made them sneer. To his shame, Alastor Moody stood among them, leaning on his cane. With a shocked blink, he realized that Moody's eye was missing and had been replaced by a false one. It zeroed in on him, though Moody's face was expressionless as he passed.

"Come on, Black," said Robards, nodding towards Crouch's office.

Sirius cast a last look at Moody before resigning himself to retreat down the corridor. Losing the respect of Alastor Moody hurt more than any hissed curse from a stranger. It had taken ages to get Moody to trust him, and it was only just before James and Lily had been killed that Moody grudgingly admitted that he thought Sirius was a good soldier and suggested Sirius join the Auror department someday. Moody claimed to trust no one, but Sirius realized it wasn't true. It took tremendous effort to gain Moody's confidence, and almost none to lose it. He could only imagine Moody's supreme disappointment in him.

There was no time to dwell on it before the door to Crouch's office swung open and Sirius was escorted inside. Bartemius Crouch Sr., a man disliked by both of Sirius's parents, sat stiffly behind the desk, watching Sirius carefully as he came in. A chair with a padded leather cushion stood at the desk.

"Please sit, Mr. Black," said Crouch, indicating the seat.

Sirius did, reluctantly. Robards and Proudfoot flanked the door, perhaps waiting for a dismissal that never came. It almost made Sirius smile. Crouch was afraid he might attack, which Sirius only found humorous because he also did not like Crouch.

"You should understand, Mr. Black, that this is all temporary," Crouch began.

Sirius raised his brows. "How's that?"

"Your release is contingent on the good favor of the Minister," said Crouch. "The circumstances of your exoneration are nothing more than a misinterpretation of the law and a pile of gold deposited in the right vaults. I assure you, should you commit so much as a misdemeanor, I will not hesitate to put you back where you belong."

"I'm not a criminal," said Sirius, leaning back. "So I don't see why it has to be temporary."

Then Crouch smiled. On a man who rarely did so, it was a bit unnerving. Even Proudfoot shifted uncomfortably.

"Well, Minister Bagnold won't be Minister forever, will she? Eventually, she will retire and a new Minister will be selected. I expect the next one may not be so willing to allow a mass murderer to walk free."

"What exactly are the circumstances of my release?" ventured Sirius, genuinely curious. "I know my mother had something to do with it."

"A loophole in the law," Crouch explained. "Your family solicitor spotted it, and we were forced to recognize it. This is how we will proceed, Mr. Black. You will be released and you will regain all rights and properties. Your wand will be returned to you and any items seized by the department will revert to your possession."

It seemed too simple. "So I'm just allowed to…be a person again? Just like that."

"Your record has been cleared," Crouch said contemptuously. His mustache twitched with guarded fury. "I assure you, however, that it has not been forgotten."

Cleared. Cleared?

Could it have been so easy?

Sirius closed his mouth. "What am I supposed to do now?"

Crouch glared as if he knew exactly what he wanted to tell Sirius what to do. He didn't answer. Instead, he shoved a roll of parchment toward him.

"Sign that," Crouch ordered. "It absolves the department of all responsibility of your _wrongful imprisonment._ "

Sirius scoffed. "I'm not going to sign that."

"You will sign it, or I will insist your mother be granted custody of you until your probationary period has ended."

"Probationary period? I thought I was a citizen again."

"Not without its limitations, Black," said Crouch. "You may not leave the country and you will report weekly to an Auror regarding your activities. I understand Healer Honeycutt has recommended counseling once a week as well. Misbehavior will result in my recommendation to the Minister that you should be reincarcerated immediately. Is that quite clear?"

Sirius bit back a sarcastic remark and merely nodded. Barty Crouch was simply a man begging to be mocked, but Sirius knew how stupid it would be to fall prey to his own whims. Crouch was steadily working to have Sirius rowed back across the sea and reinterred in his cell. He reached for the quill on Crouch's desk and dipped it into the inkwell, pausing before he signed his name and reading the script as the ink dripped. One glance up at Crouch, however, had him jotting his name down quickly.

Sirius returned the quill to the inkwell. Crouch stood, and Sirius knew the meeting was over.

"Robards, Proudfoot, show him out. Return his wand and his belongings before he leaves. _Make sure_ he leaves."

Sirius followed the Aurors through the door and back through the corridor. The rest of the department had apparently gone back to work, but there were still a few Aurors around to sneer at him as Robards and Proudfoot took him to reclaim his things.

He hadn't expected the strike of emotion to wallop him so ardently when he was given the clothes he'd been wearing when he went after Wormtail…the clothes he'd worn when he discovered that James was dead. The leather jacket, once a prized possession, made him remember the wind that whipped through it as he raced on his motorbike toward Godric's Hollow, praying that he wasn't too late. His trousers were still ripped from falling to his knees at James's side. The wallet had a few quid and a false Muggle I.D. Otherwise, there hadn't been much on his person when he rushed to warn James about Wormtail.

Except his wand.

Robards opened a case. Sirius's hand shook as he reached for it. The wand that had chosen him when he was eleven was still in one piece. He thought they'd snapped it for sure when they took it from him.

"Why wasn't it snapped?" he said to Robards.

"Couldn't say. They might have wanted to keep it for evidence."

"Evidence for what? My imaginary trial?"

Robards merely closed the case and gestured for Sirius to leave the room. Proudfoot was already at the door, checking her watch impatiently. They were near to the door when Sirius stopped suddenly and whirled on Robards.

"Prior Incantato," he blurted, showing Robards his wand.

Robards gave him a dark look. "What about it?"

"My last spell," said Sirius.

"A blasting curse," supplied Proudfoot. "We all know."

"It wasn't, I swear. I never threw that curse. It was Pettigrew—"

Robards and Proudfoot shared a look of disgust, but Sirius stepped in the way before Robards could leave. Sirius knew it wouldn't clear his name, not yet anyway, but _someone_ had to know he hadn't thrown that blasting curse, and if his instincts were correct, Robards was a fair and intelligent Auror. If he could cast doubt in Robards' mind, there were enough Aurors who respected him enough to listen to him.

"Please," said Sirius. "I promise I'll leave right after."

Proudfoot leaned against the door. She tilted her head. "Why not, Gawain? If you won't, I'll do it. I'm curious what he wants to show us."

Robards seemed to be thinking very quickly of a reason why it might be a bad idea. When none came to him, he sighed and brandished his own wand.

" _Prior Incantato,"_ said Robards.

A blaze of light burst from the tip of Sirius's wand, holding steady like a Muggle torch. Robards frowned at Proudfoot who raised her brows curiously.

"Shield charm," she said. "All right, that's fairly interesting, I suppose. And the one before that?"

" _Prior Incantato,"_ Robards said again, watching Sirius carefully.

A spark of red light illuminated the room. Sirius felt like he had been punched in the gut, remembering which spell he'd tried to cast before he'd gone into the Potters' dark cottage. He had tried to wake James up.

"Reviving Spell," Sirius clarified, voice cracking.

Proudfoot straightened. She and Robards were frowning at each other as if trying to piece together what it meant. Sirius merely took his wand from Robards' hand and turned to leave. They did nothing to stop him from strolling down the corridor, taking the elevator to the Atrium, and stepping out onto the street.

Remus Lupin threw the newspaper into the hungry flames. Words and photographs curled into the fire, burning fiercely as he watched on, wishing he could throw his memories in with them. He slumped on the ottoman, mesmerized.

Nearly a week had passed since the first whispers of a possible exoneration reached him in his tiny corner of the country. He had been working as a groundskeeper at a Muggle government building, tearing out weeds and clipping hedges, only to return home and discover the disturbing headline of the latest _Daily Prophet._ To think, he'd made dinner and almost eaten it all before he remembered he hadn't perused the news yet. Remus had unfurled his newspaper and then nearly ejected his entire meal.

Sirius's _mother_ had gotten involved. The family solicitor had been called, and it was leaked to the _Daily Prophet_ that Sirius had been denied a trial in the wake of his arrest. Although there were dozens of others who'd been arrested and sentenced without trial, what apparently made Sirius's case unique was that the only witnesses to his crime happened to be Muggles. An antiquated law stated that a wizard could not be convicted of a magical crime on the testimony of Muggles alone. Sirius's other crime, betraying his best friends to Voldemort, could also not be proven considering no one other than the Potters were present to confirm that Sirius had been Secret Keeper at all. The Ministry were forced to release him.

Remus had burned that headline too.

It seemed that money could buy anything, Remus thought. So fitting that Sirius would insist he was nothing like his family only to lean into it in the end. Bitterly, he remembered his father telling his mother once, _"Wealth looks after wealth."_

The latest headline, one that Remus read reluctantly, announced that Black was now free. They tried to interview him, but he apparently refused. Since he had left the Ministry that morning, he had disappeared.

Remus stared at the fire for a few more moments before lurching to his feet and shuffling towards the kitchen. He was only twenty-five, but he felt decades older. The full moon approached and the weight of it drew his shoulders forward and curved his spine with fatigue. Everything became a herculean effort in the days surrounding the full moon. Performing his job became a nightmare as he tried to hide his weakness from employers whose initial pity eventually turned into annoyance at his unexpected absences. Some thought he was a drunkard. Others considered him lazy. Remus wished he could have been either of those things over what he really was.

There was a spider on his kettle that he flicked off thoughtlessly. His mind was elsewhere as he filled the kettle with water and then pointed his wand at it. Steam billowed from the spout. He went for the little tin, but to his disappointment, it was empty.

"Damn," he muttered. He set the kettle back on the stovetop, remembering sheepishly how earlier that day, he'd remarked to himself that he needed to stop for more tea before he went home.

He thought of the bottle of firewhiskey in the cabinet by the fireplace. Perhaps a nightcap would settle his mind better than tea anyway. Abandoning the darkened kitchen, Remus made for the cabinet when there was a knock on the front door. Startled, Remus went for his wand.

It couldn't have been Sirius. He could not have known Remus lived here. Before that night three years ago, Remus had been living in a flat in York which was where Sirius would have thought to find him. The cottage that Remus lived in now once belonged to his parents—when his father moved into his own flat, he'd given it to Remus, but Sirius couldn't have known that. Unless…unless Sirius had tried the flat in York and decided to try the Lupin cottage instead…

Remus gripped his wand tightly. He approached the door when the knocking started again, urgently this time. A rumble of thunder shook the cottage as he reached for the handle. Remus knew he should've pretended he wasn't home, yet he swung it open anyway, thrusting his wand into the newcomer's face.

Lightning struck somewhere close, flashing a light on the terrible visage in the threshold. If Remus hadn't seen photographs of him in the _Daily Prophet,_ he might not have recognized the emaciated man before him. Soaked and only half-illuminated, Sirius looked like a vampire.

Before Remus could slam the door, a claw-like hand caught it.

"You won't hear me out, Moony?"

"Get out," Remus said, jabbing Sirius in the chest with his wand tip.

"I've been looking for you for ages," said Sirius as if he didn't notice Remus threatening him. He wiped the rain from his face and ducked around the door. Remus's hand trembled. A voice in his head howled at him to do it—to curse him, hex him, _kill_ him. That lupine part of his mind that slipped in when he was angry snarled at him to go for the throat, and for once, Remus wished the full moon were tonight.

Sirius cast a drying spell on himself, making Remus's stomach sink. They'd given him his wand back.

"How _dare_ you show up here?" Remus hissed. "Leave now or I'll kill you."

Sirius went on into the room and straight for the sofa. He sank into the cushions as if no time had passed, as if he hadn't betrayed his best friends and murdered the other, as if he hadn't ruined Remus's life.

"Did you hear me?" said Remus, louder. "If you don't leave, I'll—"

"I heard you," said Sirius. "Worst of all, I believe you. And I don't blame you, Remus. If our places were switched, I would've killed you so quickly, you wouldn't have made it through the door. But you're not going to kill me. Not yet at least."

Remus knew he was being baited. He raised his wand just as Sirius dropped his head in his hands.

"Go ahead, then," Sirius said into his palms. "Do it if you'd like."

"Get out. I can't stand to look at you."

"I'd prefer if you'd kill me. You're the only one who deserves to do it."

Remus's knuckles were white on his wand. Did Sirius want it so badly he would let Remus take his life without a fight? The feral part of his mind desired it so feverishly, he could imagine himself doing it and standing triumphantly over the body, but the rest of him, the child of Lyall and Hope Lupin, recoiled at the bloody yearning.

Sirius looked up, his eyes shining and rimmed with red. It was the face of a man who had nothing, who'd given up everything for absolutely nothing, and that wretched part of Remus who had spent three long years lonely and friendless felt a traitorous twinge of pity.

"What do you want?" Remus demanded. "What could you possibly take from me that you haven't already?"

"I don't know," admitted Sirius.

"Then leave."

"I don't have anywhere else to go."

Remus gritted his teeth. "Why don't you go to your mother's house? She put so much work into setting you free, after all. She'll be missing you."

Miserably, Sirius dropped his head again, this time gripping his hair. It had been sloppily chopped, Remus noticed.

"I can't go there," whispered Sirius. "She's going to drug me and force me to be her heir. I can't do it, Remus. I've already lost James, I can't lose myself too."

The despair in his voice made it seem as though Sirius forgot that it was his own fault that James was gone—as if he hadn't been passing information to Voldemort for a year on his best friend.

"Well, she needn't do that now that you've shown your true colors," said Remus. "I'm sure she's thrilled you chose the right side after all."

"That isn't what happened," Sirius murmured.

"Isn't it?"

Sirius shook his head. "No. No. It didn't happen the way…the way everyone thinks."

Curiosity plucked a string in Remus's mind that he struggled to silence. What did he care to hear Sirius's version of events? The only one thing that mattered was that Sirius murdered his best friends. Remus readjusted the grip on his wand.

Sirius sniffed and rubbed his eyes. "Do you remember the night when we all said our last goodbyes to James and Lily and Harry before they went into hiding?"

Remus remembered vividly. It had been a week before they were killed and the last time he had seen James and Lily alive. Lily wanted a quiet party to bid them all farewell before they went deep into hiding. It was risky and strangely tense. Remus had wondered then what was going on, why the mood had been so sullen.

He didn't answer, but Sirius went on anyway.

"You were the first to leave," Sirius reminded him. "The Fidelius Charm was performed that night, I don't know if you realized that. You weren't supposed to know."

"Me?" Remus broke, frowning. "Why not?"

"Well, James and I were convinced that you were passing information to Voldemort on the rest of us."

Remus recoiled. "How dare you—?"

"Once you'd left," Sirius went on, "I was sure you were onto us. I knew you would tell Voldemort that _I_ was the Secret Keeper. Then I had an idea. I thought, why not let Voldemort believe it was me and then make _Peter_ Secret Keeper? An excellent ploy. Voldemort would never think James and Lily would use Peter for anything useful. He'd be sure to go after me. I took James aside and admittedly, he needed convincing, but he agreed eventually. Lily trusted James, and James trusted me. And I…well, I was wrong about you, and I was wrong about Peter. They performed the Fidelius Charm that night, and a week later, Peter betrayed them to Voldemort. Don't look at me like that, Remus. I'm free, aren't I? What do I have to gain by lying to you now?"

Remus didn't know, but Sirius had already proven that he was capable of turning their heads in the wrong direction. The audacity of pinning the blame on Peter? Peter, who had disregarded his own wellbeing to track down Sirius and…

Not for the first time, Remus wondered what Peter had been thinking when he tracked Sirius to that street in London. Witnesses said that Peter was beside himself, wailing accusations at Sirius before the blasting curse struck. Remus had never known Peter to do anything out of vengeance, but perhaps his grief had overtaken his judgment. Peter should have known he could never take down Sirius Black.

 _Mad with grief,_ he'd heard someone say once of Peter.

He remembered the report of Sirius laughing when he was arrested. _Mad with grief._ Remus tried to shove the phrase from his mind, but he couldn't help it from twisting in his thoughts. _Mad with grief._

If Sirius knew what was going on in Remus's head, he didn't point it out. Instead, he stood and walked past Remus toward the cabinet next to the fireplace. It squeaked open and Sirius brandished the bottle of firewhiskey, shaking it a little.

"Dear old dad left this in case of emergency, eh?"

"Put it back, Sirius."

"Does he still live here, by the way? Doesn't look like it to me. None of his things are here. I see some of your mum's, though—I know that blanket's hers. That chess set. When did you move back?"

Remus snatched the bottle from his hand and shoved him away. Sirius caught himself on the backrest of the olive chair, smiling ruefully as Remus raised his wand again.

"You need to leave now," Remus said. "I won't tell you again, Sirius."

Sirius leaned against the chair. His smile faded. "So you didn't doubt for a minute that it was me, Remus? You didn't think it could've been a mistake?"

Remus felt a muscle in his jaw twitch. When he'd first heard, he couldn't wrap his head around it, and even three years later, it still didn't add up, but he figured, perhaps that was what was so clever about Sirius Black. Perhaps he'd done it because it was the last thing expected of him. After a near-decade of dispelling any notion that he believed in the same perverted values of his family and eventually throwing away his entire family for James Potter, Sirius had done the unthinkable and…reverted to what his family always wanted him to be.

Of course, Remus had questioned Sirius's role, but what other alternatives could there have been? What Sirius was suggesting, that Peter had done it after all, that Sirius was innocent…

Remus opened the bottle of Ogden's Old Firewhisky and took a very long drink. When he was finished, he opened his eyes to find that Sirius had slumped down into the chair and was holding his hand out for his turn. Remus gave it to him. Sirius followed his example.

"I don't believe you," Remus said weakly.

"I wouldn't believe me either," said Sirius. "They should've left me in Azkaban. But at least…at least I can hunt the traitor down myself now."

Remus dropped onto the ottoman. Sirius nudged him with the bottle until he took it. The smell nipped at his nose and his eyes watered, but he wasn't sure if it had much to do with the firewhiskey.

"Do you really think I'd do that to James?" said Sirius.

They should've poured it into glasses, Remus thought. Lily would have been appalled at them, drinking directly from the bottle like they were seventh-year students at Hogwarts, yet he couldn't drag himself from the seat to fetch the lowball glasses from the cabinet. The weight of Sirius's query slumped his shoulders, keeping him anchored to his seat.

For three years, Remus had tried very hard to piece together just how he had missed the signs of Sirius being drawn into Voldemort's ranks. How could he have been so skilled at pretending to love his best friends while planning their deaths? How could he have thrown a switch and betrayed everything he had worked for since he first met James Potter? How could he have become precisely what he once vowed to destroy? Three years of sifting through unreliable memories had wearied Remus of thinking about Sirius, but now that the fiend was sitting before him, they all rushed back to him. They cascaded over him as he stared into the fire, clutching the bottle of Ogden's Old.

"I don't know," Remus admitted. "It was…hard to believe, frankly. At first, I couldn't imagine it was true. I didn't think you'd done it, not immediately, at least."

"When did you decide it was me, then?"

Remus looked down at his hands encircling the bottle. Dirt ringed his nails and cuticles. "I don't know, Sirius, I had to come to terms with it, didn't I?"

"So it _was_ difficult for you to believe," Sirius pointed out. "Let me ask you this, then. Imagine it's three years ago, and instead of me, Peter has been arrested for killing me and twelve others. He's betrayed James and Lily, and they're taking him to Azkaban for it—"

Remus emitted a low growl, though he suspected it was the wolf in him.

"—Would it have been easier to accept if Peter had done it instead of me?"

 _Yes,_ a voice in his mind said traitorously. Remus stared at Sirius who watched him curiously with his hollow cheek pressed against a loose fist.

"There is no proof," Remus said. "There's no proof that it was Peter."

"Only that Peter's alive…somewhere." Then Sirius's eyes brightened suddenly. "And you can ask Gawain Robards, the Auror. The last two spells I performed with my wand were a reviving spell and a shield charm."

Remus gripped the neck of the bottle. The last spell on Sirius's wand should have been a blasting curse.

"Did you know they only found Peter's finger?" Remus said.

"He cut it off himself," Sirius said, "before he transformed."

"And why would he do that?"

"So everyone would presume he was dead, Moony! He _panicked_. He never thought Voldemort would meet his downfall in Godric's Hollow on _his_ information. If there were Death Eaters who knew he was alive, he'd be done for, and he knew it. As far as they know, he's responsible for Voldemort's defeat."

Remus narrowed his eyes. "If that were true, it still doesn't explain how he managed to get the better of _you_. Do you mean to admit that Peter tricked you twice?"

"He had nothing left to lose," said Sirius. "And I…I thought for a split-second, maybe I'd gotten it wrong, but then Peter shouted that it was _me_ who'd betrayed James and Lily. I meant to kill him then, but he was faster."

His bones felt brittle enough to break, but the lupine part of his mind needed to move. Remus pushed off from his seat. The tiny room only allowed him to take a few steps in each direction—a few from the fireplace to the window and back again—but it was enough to satisfy jittery legs.

Sirius's question— _what do I have to gain by lying to you? —_ nagged him. What indeed? Why would Sirius feel the need to risk a nasty hex and explain to Remus his supposed side of the story if he were already a free man? Why did Sirius care what Remus thought of him? After all, Remus was only an impoverished werewolf—hardly even human.

 _He wants his friend back,_ he thought, avoiding Sirius's watchful gaze. _He needs a place to stay. He's afraid of his mother._

Sirius had always been afraid of her, no matter how cavalier he acted about it. The threats she'd hurled at him affected him far deeper than he would ever admit, and Remus supposed that Sirius might not have told even James the extent of what happened during the summers when he was shut up at Grimmauld Place. Sirius would laugh about it on the train, yet there was always an edge in his voice when he spoke of his mother, even more so than when he mocked his father or brother.

A stint in Azkaban wouldn't change that, Remus thought. Whatever Sirius had done in the name of Voldemort, it hadn't been for his family, and the uneasiness regarding his mother wouldn't have simply vanished with his betrayal. He had still run away from home when he was sixteen, and he never returned.

Perhaps it was the reason Sirius was putting this on: he was afraid to go home and he feared Remus less than he did his mother.

It would have been easier to come to that conclusion if Sirius's suggestions weren't poisoning him. Even as Remus settled on the idea that Sirius was just looking for a place to stay, he couldn't banish those tremendous doubts about the story he'd struggled to believe since Sirius had gone to prison. It was like Sirius knew how difficult it was for him to accept what happened. Was Sirius tying a blindfold over his eyes or freeing him from one?

"You should go," Remus said weakly.

"You don't mean that," said Sirius. "If you didn't think there was a chance I was telling the truth, you would've hexed me all the way back to Azkaban already."

"It's not too late for that," he warned.

There was a slight tingle in his fingertips from the firewhiskey. Maybe he was lonely. Maybe he still hated Sirius and wanted to kill him, but he couldn't remember the last time he had a visitor to his home who wasn't his father. Maybe it was worthwhile to listen to the story Sirius had concocted.

Sirius sank deeper into the chair as if to suggest he had no intention of leaving.

"I didn't want it like this," Sirius said. The blackened sockets of his eyes deepened their bluish hue after he'd rubbed them. "I told her not to meddle. She didn't even care when I told her I was innocent—she just wants her heir back. She doesn't give a damn if everyone believes I'm a Death Eater. I got off on a technicality and a mountain of gold, not innocence. D'you know what it's like to be universally loathed?"

Then Remus laughed and took a long drink. Sirius had the decency to look sheepish.

"Well, I guess you do," admitted Sirius. He reached his hand out for the bottle. "May I?"

Instead of handing it to him, Remus knelt by the cabinet and withdrew two lowballs into which he poured the last of it. The bottle hadn't had much left, and he thought it was only fair to split the final dregs. He handed a glass to Sirius but withheld it at the last moment.

"Why did you come here?" Remus asked again.

Sirius shrugged. "I dunno. I guess I thought you deserved to know the truth. Also, can't stand the thought of you hating me for what you think I've done. I'd rather you hate me for what I actually did."

Remus's heart pounded. "Which is?"

"I convinced James that you were the spy," Sirius said bitterly. "All of it's my fault."

Sirius Black was never a liar. He was too proud to hide his true feelings on anything, and if he did, he could never do it convincingly, at least in Remus's opinion. There was always a tell—perhaps Sirius was _too_ adamant as if he were trying to convince himself to believe something. Sometimes he made an inappropriate joke or he couldn't stop himself from laughing out of discomfort.

The guilt that swam in his eyes made something plummet in Remus's stomach.

_Mad with grief._

He was wounded by the suggestion that James believed him to be a spy. Remus had mused on what the others must have thought of him when he disappeared for weeks at a time, but he never dreamed that his friends would actually consider he would betray them. Dumbledore sent him to integrate with the werewolf colonies, to persuade them not to join Voldemort. Remus was to convince them that whatever Voldemort promised, they'd never been seen as equals to wizards, but Dumbledore had never defended Remus to the rest—he allowed the suspicion around him to fester.

The insinuation that James and Lily had been killed because they suspected Remus was spying for Voldemort made him ill.

"I was with the werewolf colonies," Remus said as numbness spread from his fingertips to his tongue. His mouth felt lazy. "Dumbledore wanted it to be kept a secret."

"Well, you did a great job of that. You're much better at secrets than I am," said Sirius. "But not as good as Wormtail, though."

That was true. Wormtail _was_ good at keeping secrets…except when he had something to gain by spilling them.

Suddenly, Remus felt like a fool. How could he not have considered they'd gotten it wrong? What did Sirius have to gain by joining Voldemort that he couldn't have gotten from his family's gold?

Sirius had never wanted power, and Remus realized it was because he never needed it. The only thing Sirius wanted was acceptance, and it was from only one person that it mattered to him. James Potter was _everything_ to Sirius. James's mother used to call them inseparable, but that wasn't it—Sirius followed James like a puppy. Whatever James did, Sirius was sure to obey his lead. They weren't of like mind so much as Sirius needed James like he needed his own lungs.

But Peter…

Peter hid behind James and Sirius when they were the biggest bullies in school. They loved how much he seemed to love them. When Remus rolled his eyes at their antics, Peter was always there to applaud and remind them of their brilliance. When school ended, Peter's activity within the Order of the Phoenix kept him busy, but not enough to keep him away from James and Sirius, apparently. When Remus would finally catch up with the rest of them after weeks of infiltrating werewolf camps, Peter always had a part in their stories. It made Remus feel quite alienated from the group.

Peter was always interested in Remus's activities. Remus imagined then it was just curiosity at what sort of missions Dumbledore was sending him on, but he recalled suddenly _how_ curious Peter had been. He couldn't take Remus's insistence that his mission was secret. He continually pressed, offering details of his own bland missions in exchange, and only withdrew his peppering of questions when Remus bristled.

"Enough, Peter," he remembered saying once. "I can't tell you. Leave it alone."

They'd been at a Muggle pub in London. James and Sirius paused their own conversation about what they ought to name James's child who was due to arrive in a few weeks. Remus remembered distinctly the look that passed between them—one that hinted they had been talking about him when he wasn't around.

Peter shrank back, but he cheerfully changed the subject to something Remus couldn't remember.

Remus thought maybe Peter was spying for James and Sirius… With a sickening feeling, he realized it might have been for someone else.

Finally, Remus handed the glass to Sirius who gulped it down immediately.

"I know," said Sirius, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He must have seen the hurt on Remus's face. "Imagine how I felt. Did you know I went to Godric's Hollow that night? I'd been to Wormtail's place to check in on him, but he wasn't home. He should've been there, but there was nothing out of place, no sign of a struggle. It didn't feel right. I knew that something was wrong, so I set out to warn James…but then I saw the house in ruins and I found James in the doorway…"

His lip trembled. He cast his gaze down at the empty glass.

Remus's heart jumped in his throat as he stared at Sirius trying to hold it together. _Do I believe him?_

"Hagrid was there already," Sirius went on. "I was looking for Lily and Harry, hoping they'd somehow made it out. They'd only made it to the nursery, though. Lily…she was on the floor."

Remus blinked. He'd not heard any of this. He had not spoken to anyone about that night except for Dumbledore, but Dumbledore was not gratuitous with his details. He didn't mention that Sirius had come by Godric's Hollow, only that Hagrid had gone to search for survivors…

"But Harry…" Sirius swallowed thickly, a miserable smile plucking at the edge of his mouth. "He was so small in Hagrid's arms. He was crying and I couldn't believe it. I thought maybe Lily had hidden him and Voldemort couldn't find him, but then I saw that Harry was bleeding from his forehead as if…as if Voldemort had _tried_ to kill him." Then he made a noise like the disjointed union of a laugh and a sob. "Can you imagine? Our Harry, little Harry—the downfall of Lord Voldemort himself."

Sirius eyed the amber that swirled within the glass in Remus's hand. Something like pity prompted Remus to offer it, and Sirius gulped that down too.

"Hagrid wouldn't let me have him," said Sirius. "I tried though. I said I was his godfather, but Hagrid insisted he was taking him to Lily's sister. Can you think of how different it'd all be if I'd just been a little more insistent? After all, Hagrid _handed_ him to me. I could've bolted. I could've just taken him. Maybe I wouldn't have gone to Azkaban. Maybe I could've kept my head and told Dumbledore what happened. Maybe those people would still be alive—"

"Stop that," Remus snapped. He plucked both empty glasses from Sirius's hands. "You don't need Dementors to be terrorized by your own guilt. I'm astounded you didn't go mad in Azkaban."

"Who said I didn't?"

"What do you think would have happened if you'd taken Harry?" said Remus. "You would have been forced to hide with him until they found you and took him."

"I'm good at hiding," Sirius said halfheartedly. Then he waved the thought away as if he knew it wasn't true. "You can see why I let Hagrid take him in the end. What good was I to him at the time? All of the evidence was against me, and Dumbledore would attest that I'd been Secret Keeper, so I went after Wormtail instead and well, you know the rest."

It was all too much without bringing Harry into it, Remus thought. What would have happened if Sirius had taken Harry, innocent or not?

The rain had started to pound against the windows as if someone had turned a showerhead at the cottage. Lightning flashed as the storm grew wilder, whipping branches and making the shutters flap. Sirius jerked at a clap of thunder that rattled some of the glassware in the cabinet. Once he'd relaxed, Sirius nodded to the glasses in Remus's hands.

"Got anything else to drink?"

"Water," said Remus.

"Any of your mum's old stuff? She and your dad used to drink brandy together, didn't they?"

There was still a little left of his mother's favorite brandy, tucked away in the back of the cabinet, but Remus couldn't bring himself to have the last of it. At the uncomfortable look on Remus's face, Sirius sighed.

"Have you seen him, then? Harry?"

Remus sat down hard on the ottoman again, watching the embers of the fire burned down. "No," he said. "Dumbledore asked me not to."

Sirius frowned. "Why?"

"He said he wanted Harry to have a normal childhood, away from our world."

"Because you're a real spoiler of normalcy, is that it?" He grunted, trailing a hand through his choppy hair. "He really thinks so highly of Lily's sister then? Petunia _hates_ magic, and she hated James. What sort of normal childhood is that?"

"Everyone knows his name. I suppose Dumbledore wants to keep him away from all of that," Remus said. "Do you know what they call him?"

Sirius shook his head.

"The Boy-Who-Lived. He's the most well-known child in the country. Children pretend to be him—parents tell them stories about him when they go to bed. I imagine Dumbledore thought it would all go to his head…"

"Oh yes, keeping him away from his parents' old friends, that'll keep him humble," said Sirius. "Well, it won't be for much longer. Soon enough, I'll find a place and bring Harry home. I'm sure he's had enough of Petunia and whatever her husband's name is."

Remus looked at him in alarm. It hadn't occurred to him that now that Sirius was free, he had the right to claim guardianship over his godson.

Then Sirius smiled darkly. "And I thought you were beginning to believe me."

"Leave Harry alone, Sirius," Remus said, voice low.

"Please, you know as well as I how horrible Petunia is," said Sirius. "And I'm well within my rights. It's what James would've wanted, anyway."

"James would have wanted what was safest for Harry," Remus cut in. He was rising from his seat as panic struck him. Not even Dumbledore would have the power to stop Sirius from taking Harry away—the law was on Sirius's side. If his record was expunged and he had a solicitor on his side, Sirius would have Harry in his custody in days.

Then Sirius glowered. "What is _wrong_ with you? What d'you think I'd do to him?"

That was the problem, Remus didn't know. If Sirius were truly innocent, perhaps it would be perfectly fine, but if he weren't…

"He's safe at Petunia's," said Remus, feigning calm. "If—if you really are innocent like you claim, you'll do what's best for Harry, even if _you_ aren't what's best for him."

"So you really think Petunia is a better caretaker than me?"

"She does already have a son—"

That angered Sirius more than anything. He stood, his pale and hollow face crimson with fury and whisky as he towered over Remus who did not shrink back.

"Lily and James made me godfather for a _reason_ , Remus," Sirius ground out. "Do you think you know better than James? Even Lily chose me over her own sister. Where were _you_ when he was born? Where were _you_ when I was changing his nappies? Where were you when I was up feeding him so Lily and James could get some rest? How dare you suggest I'm incapable of taking care of him!"

"Well, where have you been for three years, Sirius?" Remus bit back. "Three years in Azkaban were the best you could've done for Harry?"

"And sitting on your arse playing nice for Dumbledore was the best _you_ could do," said Sirius. "You couldn't set aside your own misery for a minute to go see him, could you? You're a coward, Lupin."

"You're the arrogant fool who had his parents killed."

Remus thought Sirius would hit him. Loathing widened Sirius's eyes and darkened the shadows on his skeletal face. His bony hands were curled into fists at his sides, shaking as if he wanted to strike Remus in the gut. All of his years in Azkaban were reflected in his expression—years lost to anger and fear and misery—as if he'd not needed Remus to tell him whose fault it all was.

With a sneer, Sirius turned on his heel and stomped away towards the door.

Remus grabbed his arm with a good jerk, sending Sirius stumbling backward. Weakly, Sirius tried to pull free, but Remus held fast.

"You're not walking out now," he said. "You can't Apparate like this."

"Fuck off, Remus."

"You have nowhere to go," Remus reminded him.

"I'll find somewhere," Sirius said dimly.

"Like an alley in London? Sit down, Sirius."

Sirius threw off Remus's hand. He didn't sit down, but he didn't make for the door either. Instead, he simply stalked to the other side of the room, out of Remus's reach, and stood staring out the window which was blackened by the storm. He must have caught his own reflection because he looked away quickly.

"I know he's better off without me," Sirius said. "But I know he's not better off with her, Remus."

Remus had never met Petunia Dursley, but he'd seen Lily cry over her. Her disappointment that her only sister hadn't shown up for her wedding, so soon after their parents had passed away had devastated her. James spoke of Petunia as if he couldn't believe she was Lily's sister, that they'd once been close before Lily went to school.

"She hates magic," James had said. "And she thinks I'm _unemployed._ "

Remus recalled Sirius shrugging. "Well, she's not technically wrong…"

"It kills Lily," James went on. "Petunia pretends she doesn't have a sister at all because she _knows_ what it does to Lily."

Would Petunia have the maturity to set aside the loathing for her sister and love Harry as he deserved? Perhaps Dumbledore thought so, but Remus had his doubts—

"Do you believe me, Remus?" Sirius broke through his thoughts.

"I really don't know—"

Sirius clenched his fists again. " _Yes, you do_. Stop dithering. You pretend to be so mild, so _polite_ , but it's only because you're afraid to make a decision. You're afraid to take a stance on anything without ruminating on it for years. You know the truth in your gut, Remus, so spit it out."

And Remus did.

The breath he'd been holding left him in a rush and the tension in his body faded to unmask the ache of his muscles. He felt a bit woozy at the release as if his terror and fury had been all that was keeping him upright. The lamps flickered as he fixed his gaze on his estranged friend.

"I believe you."


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the follows and lovely reviews! This was strangely a challenging chapter to get out so I apologize for the wait, but I can’t thank you all enough for reading.

* * *

**Chapter Three**

* * *

Petunia Dursley was on edge.

She managed to keep her smile tight and manner pleasant while Vernon went on about the meetings he had planned for the day. When she mistakenly poured scalding coffee over her hand, she bit back a cry and quickly shoved it under cold water, hoping Vernon wouldn’t notice. Luckily, Dudley began to wail that he’d dropped his sausage on the floor, and Vernon barked at the other boy to give his to Dudley.

Vernon was not naturally observant and thankfully, had not noticed Petunia’s peculiar behavior over the last two days. Each time the phone rang or someone pressed the bell on the front door, Petunia gasped and clasped a hand to her chest. She spent most of her time locked in the house, watching the street diligently for suspicious characters.

Vernon shoved away from the breakfast table and patted Dudley on the head. Petunia’s smile withered.

“You’re going?” she said, failing to keep the misery from her voice.

Despite wishing to distract Vernon, she desperately hoped for him to stay. Without him, she was completely defenseless.

“Afraid so,” said Vernon, adjusting his tie.

Petunia kissed him farewell and he left, his car rumbling down the drive.

The house that she and Vernon had purchased years ago, the place where Petunia once felt safest, suddenly seemed terribly empty without him. When she went to clear the spot where Vernon had been, she found those eyes so eerily like her sister’s staring at her. Did he know? With a shudder, she looked away.

“Go to your cupboard,” she snapped.

The boy scrambled from his chair, leaving his plate and cup behind. Usually she would have snarled at him to clean up after himself, but she was desperate to keep him away today. He was a constant reminder of the threat that loomed over the family. _He_ was the reason for the visit two days earlier.

It had been a particularly normal morning following Vernon’s departure for work. She had taken Dudley to Piers Polkiss’s house so Mrs. Polkiss could bring them to a park, and she set the other boy to chores around the house. The boy was nearly five and only really capable of scrubbing floors and dusting, but it kept him busy while she found time to be herself for a few hours.

She had nearly finished with a housekeeping magazine when there was a knock on the door. The boy was somewhere upstairs, dusting or something, but he was forbidden to answer the door anyway. Petunia rose from the sofa and answered, only to scream at the sight of the man at her door.

“What are _you_ doing here?”

Though she had never met him personally, Lily’s description of her old headmaster was a difficult one to forget, and there was no mistaking the tall, bearded man with the flowing robes on her doorstep.

He invited himself in. He sat her down while she prayed that Harry wouldn’t come downstairs and he told her that the boy’s godfather had been released from prison. While in Petunia’s opinion, that sounded like good news and she could finally get rid of the boy, but to Albus Dumbledore, it was a dangerous situation.

“You must not let him take Harry,” Dumbledore warned.

“Why not?” Petunia sniffed. “If he wants the boy, why not? He’s been a burden on us long enough, I think.”

“You’ll remember my last letter,” said Dumbledore.

Petunia paled. She most certainly did but wished she did not. He’d gone on about macabre things such as blood protections and spells. He had cautioned that if she didn’t accept the boy, he would be in grave danger.

“Then this godfather of his should know to stay away,” Petunia said.

“Unfortunately, I do not believe his godfather wishes the best for young Harry,” said Dumbledore. “I expect he will come to call eventually, but _you must not allow him to take Harry._ Do you understand, Petunia? If you care for him, you will keep him here no matter what.”

“You—you don’t suppose he’d _hurt_ the boy, do you?”

“I would not be here if I didn’t think as much.”

By the time Dumbledore left, Petunia was trembling.

She did not tell Vernon what happened for fear that he would throw the boy out or perhaps even offer him to the godfather.

It was odd. While she did not care for her nephew and loathed that she was forced to take in the abnormal child of her abnormal sister, she could hardly find it within herself to actively put him in harm’s way.

So for days, she jumped at shadows while she waited for the godfather to come.

After Vernon left on Friday morning, Petunia tidied the kitchen while Dudley watched television in the other room and her nephew fiddled with his toys in his cupboard. It occurred to her that perhaps she should have moved the boy up into the spare bedroom, but it was a fleeting thought.

Someone rang the bell when it was nearly eleven o’clock. Petunia shuddered.

She peeked into the room where Dudley sat with his nose pressed to the screen, his eyes blazing with the light of the television. She ought to have told him to move away from it, but she couldn’t stand the screaming, so she walked by without a word. While she listened at the cupboard door, she heard the boy making pretend voices for his toys. She pounded on the door and told him to be quiet.

The bell went again.

Petunia sucked in a breath and opened it with a new, fresh shriek.

There was a creature on the doorstep, one that towered over her. His grey eyes gleamed from hollow sockets, his black hair hung heavy over his brow, and a mocking smile exposed yellowed teeth. He caught the door with a hand as she made to slam it shut.

“Hello, Petunia,” he said.

Petunia shrank away, fumbling for the vase on the table. She gripped it and raised it over her head. “What do you want?”

“Put that down, I’m not going to hurt you,” he said. But he was smirking as if he liked that she was afraid of him. Petunia backed up, and he poked his head around the corner to see Dudley pasted to the television. Dudley hadn’t noticed anything amiss, thankfully. “Where is he?”

“Get out!” she hissed. “Or I’ll call the police!”

He didn’t seem to care. He sidled by her down the hall that led to the kitchen. While he passed the cupboard that had gone silent, Petunia clenched the vase. Thankfully the boy had the sense to keep quiet. The kitchen door swung open and for a moment, the man disappeared behind it, though it didn’t take him long to confirm that the boy wasn’t there.

When the man reemerged, she could see that his patience grew thin.

“Come on, I’m not stupid,” he said. “I know he’s here.” He leaned to inspect the photographs on the wall. Not one of them contained the boy. “I would’ve thought you eager to get rid of him.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Petunia snapped. “There’s no one else here.”

His eyes flickered to the cupboard to his left. To Petunia’s horror, a yellowish glow squeezed from the vent. He frowned.

“You left the light on,” he remarked.

“I was looking for something earlier,” she said. “Stop—!”

But it was too late, his hand was already reaching for the handle. With a burst of panic, Petunia hurled the porcelain vase at him and was sure it would crash over his head. She watched triumphantly as it arced in the air. Yet it never landed—instead, it froze mid-air at the tip of a wand he’d brandished from his pocket. Petunia gasped and ducked as he sent it smoothly over her own head back to its home on the table.

She recovered quickly enough to see him turning the handle.

Light spilled over him as he swung the door wide, and she watched with dread as the curiosity on his face quickly melted into confusion. Petunia couldn’t see the boy, but she knew what the man saw.

He’d gone to his knees.

“Harry?” he said as if unable to believe his eyes.

Petunia edged away.

He would see the cot—he would see the pillow and stacks of Dudley’s old clothing. He would see the broken toys and the spiders in the ceiling. He would see the shoes with holes and the blanket with mold, and what would he do?

Then she remembered Dumbledore’s warning about the godfather. _“You don’t suppose he’d hurt the boy, do you?”_ she’d asked. His reply had been chilling: “ _I_ _would not be here if I didn’t think as much.”_ But perhaps the man wouldn’t care—perhaps he simply wanted to take the boy—

Oh, but she was quite wrong.

The man stood suddenly, his wand tight in his hand as he stared at Petunia.

“Does he sleep in here?” he demanded.

“N-n-no,” she said.

“Liar,” he snarled. “I can’t believe this. He’s a child, Petunia. You can’t keep him in a _cupboard_ like a—a mop or a coat. What the hell is _wrong_ with you? Come on, Harry, get out of there.”

“It’s okay,” she heard the boy mutter.

“No, it absolutely is not,” the man said. He swallowed hard and knelt again at the entry to the cupboard. “You should have a real bed, Harry, and a room to sleep in. Is that something you’d like?”

“I guess,” the boy said, and something dropped in Petunia’s stomach. She never considered the boy might have his own opinions—she assumed he considered it normal that he slept in a cupboard, particularly since he didn’t know any differently.

The man took the old blanket from the cot, and to her horror, he transformed it into a bag which he offered to the boy in the cupboard.

“Put anything you’d like in here, Harry. We’ll be leaving as soon as you’re packed.”

“Where are we going?” the boy asked.

The man moved out of the way while the boy clambered out and began to shovel things, mostly Dudley’s old clothes and toys, into the bag. Petunia bit back her insistence that they weren’t for the boy to take, but she imagined the man turning his wrath on her at the point of his wand.

“You—you can’t take him,” she said weakly.

“Can’t I? I suppose you’re going to stop me?”

Petunia realized the futility of the situation, and wondered what that fool Dumbledore was thinking when he told her not to let the godfather take the boy. What hope did she have against one of _them?_ Her one attempt to expel him had been completely pointless.

Besides, she thought dully, did she even want the boy?

Clearly this man cared for him despite what Dumbledore suggested. If he didn’t, why would he mind that the boy slept in a cupboard? The only reason she agreed to keep the boy was for fear that he would be harmed.

“You—you won’t hurt him, will you?” she ventured, watching as the boy stuffed an old pair of shoes into the cursed bag.

“Of course I won’t,” he said. “Have _you?”_

“How dare you?”

Yet he must have caught the way she swallowed hard. It wasn’t like she _beat_ the boy or anything—perhaps she had been a bit rough sometimes or pushed him too hard, but it wasn’t like he’d bruised. Dudley was the one who hit him but they were only children and Dudley was simply playing. Was it her fault that her nephew had been born scrawny and an easy target for her son?

He turned away from her in disgust. “Your sister would be ashamed of you.”

When Harry was through, he showed the man the bag.

“Great, Harry.”

“What’s your name?” said the boy. Petunia saw that he regarded the man warily, as if he wasn’t sure why a terrifying looking stranger was treating him with kindness.

“Sirius. I’m your godfather, Harry.”

“What’s that?”

“It means I’m going to look after you from now on. Would you like to come live with me?”

The boy didn’t have to think about it. He nodded. Enthusiastically.

“What—what will I tell that Dumbledore person?” Petunia asked, backing up so the man and the boy could pass.

“Tell him about the cupboard,” he said simply.

And to Petunia’s relief, he steered her nephew to the door and then they were gone. Dudley looked up from the television briefly and glanced at her, confused.

“Where’s my lunch?”

\--

“Sirius Black, are you completely out of your mind?”

Sirius had expected the question when he led Harry through the door to Remus’s cottage but he hadn’t thought Remus would be awake yet. The full moon had rendered Remus completely exhausted, and when Sirius left, Remus had been dead asleep. Even that morning when he dropped a pan in the kitchen that echoed through the cottage, there was no sign that Remus had heard it from his bedroom.

Sirius was ashamed to admit it, but he’d been eagerly awaiting the full moon since he arrived at Remus’s cottage. The time before the transformation had been spent reconciling the past and discussing what each of them had missed during the war. While Voldemort had been defeated that October night, the war still went on. It was particularly painful for Sirius to learn of the Longbottoms, how Frank and Alice had been tortured into insanity—he had heard something alluding to the fact while he was in Azkaban, but to learn the entirety of what happened to them made him ill.

Something about Remus was different—darker, wearier, lonelier. In the deliberate way that he spoke, Remus seemed to be holding back in a way that reminded Sirius of the boy he’d known in their first year of Hogwarts as if Remus didn’t quite trust Sirius like he wanted to. The old rhythm of their friendship was gone. Conversations were forced and laughs were unnatural as they skirted around the obvious—that their friendship had been limbs of a larger body and they had never existed just the two of them. Without James or Wormtail, there were silences that Sirius never noticed before between himself and Remus. Of course, Sirius had spent plenty of time with Remus alone, but now that they only had each other, Sirius wasn’t sure how to act anymore.

But when the full moon came, things were normal for a moment. They howled at the unpolluted sky and wrestled as wolf and dog all night until Sirius forgot he’d ever been a human in a prison cell. In the morning, he helped Remus back into the cottage and put him to bed.

Invigorated and feeling much more like himself, Sirius sprawled out on the couch while Remus slept and tried to close his eyes. He couldn’t rest. He couldn’t stop wondering about Harry—his heart hammered as he remembered James and Lily asking him to be godfather months before Harry had been born. While he stared at the cracked plaster, watching a lanky spider scuttle into a corner, Sirius knew that if he wanted to get to Harry soon, he would have to do it while Remus was incapacitated otherwise Remus would talk him out it. There were soft snores emanating from Remus’s room when Sirius could no longer suppress the urge to get up and rescue his godson. He knew Remus would be livid, but it didn’t matter.

Harry was currently sitting on the sofa, staring in wonderment at the frames on the wall, and it occurred to Sirius that he’d never seen a wizarding photograph before. Very gingerly, Remus crept down the stairs. Sirius grimaced.

At Remus’s exclamation, Sirius pulled his mouth into a guilty smile.

“Harry, this is Remus. He was a friend of your parents too. He’s a bit cross because he’s very tired,” Sirius said. “Come meet Harry, Remus.”

Sirius could see the struggle between Remus hoping to make a good impression with Harry and his bafflement at what Sirius had done. Truthfully, Remus wasn’t wrong at how foolishly he’d acted, but Sirius couldn’t take another moment knowing Harry was stuck in that house with that _woman_. Following what he discovered, he had nothing to regret. Even thinking of that cupboard made him grit his teeth.

“Hello, Harry,” Remus said mildly, holding tightly to the wall.

Harry waved shyly.

“I’m…” Remus fumbled for what to say. “I wish you would have told me first, Sirius.”

Sirius leaned back. “You would have told me not to do it.”

“It was foolish,” he said. “It _is_ foolish. You’ve…taken the _Boy-Who-Lived,_ Sirius. Don’t you suppose this will have a consequence?”

“No one knows I’m here,” Sirius pointed out. “And it won’t be for long. I’ll find a place for us this week, and we’ll be out of your hair.”

“You’ve got to bring him back to Petunia.”

Neither of them missed the crestfallen look on Harry’s face.

Sirius cleared his throat. “Harry, would you tell Remus where you sleep at your aunt’s house?”

“My cupboard,” Harry said as if it were normal.

Remus looked bemused. “What do you mean your cupboard, Harry?”

“He _means_ a cupboard under the stairs,” said Sirius. “Isn’t that right, Harry?”

The boy nodded, though he didn’t quite see what was wrong with it. That only made Sirius want to Apparate back to Little Whinging and switch the floor and the ceiling at Number 4.

“Well…that…” Remus trailed, paling. “It still wasn’t a good idea to take him, Sirius.”

“Could you honestly suggest you wouldn’t do the same?”

“No,” said Remus. “But I wouldn’t have gone in the first place! You should have thought this through. What does it look like, stealing him away from his Muggle relatives without a bit of documentation? Custody isn’t simply putting a roof over his head—which, by the way, you haven’t got either. You said Crouch was looking for a reason to arrest you, and what have you done? You’ve kidnapped the most famous child in the world! Are you insane?”

“I’ll figure it out,” Sirius mumbled.

Remus sank into the chair, the conversation clearly taking a toll on him. He had a right to be concerned—Crouch _was_ on the prowl for any misdeeds committed by Sirius and no, taking Harry without permission wouldn’t do him any favors. Also, there was the possibility that Dumbledore might ensure that Sirius wasn’t hiding out at the Lupin cottage. There was no reason to think that Dumbledore would suspect that Remus might welcome his old friend back into his life, but Dumbledore had surprised Sirius before. With Harry missing, Dumbledore would leave no stone unturned.

But like he’d told Remus, what else was he supposed to do? He couldn’t stand to think about Harry spending another minute in that house, not if he could do something about it.

“Does he even know who you are?” said Remus.

Sirius smiled at Harry. “He does now.”

Although Harry seemed glad to be away from Petunia, he wasn’t entirely at ease with Sirius either for which he could hardly be blamed. After all, Sirius knew he didn’t appear like someone a child should trust—in fact, he looked a bit more like a villain than a hero at the moment.

Harry stared at his knees, gripping his hands at his sides. This wasn’t a baby anymore. Harry was a child—a real, small person with no autonomy which meant that Sirius would have to make decisions for him from now on. Suddenly he felt a bit woozy.

“What about magic?” Remus prompted.

“Well, I had to get him here somehow, didn’t I?” said Sirius, tearing his gaze from Harry. “Can’t do that without explaining a bit to him.”

Remus’s mouth parted in alarm. “Did you—did you _Apparate_ with him?”

“No,” Sirius said. “I’m not that stupid. I summoned the Knight Bus. We had a long chat about magic and godfathers on the way.”

What he said must have struck Remus as worse than Apparating with a small child because Remus covered his face with a hand and sunk deeper into his seat.

“What?” Sirius demanded.

“Who saw you?”

“What d’you mean?”

Remus groaned. “You idiot, Padfoot. The conductor and driver saw you. There must have been passengers who saw you. You don’t suppose word will spread of what you’ve done?”

“I changed our faces a little,” said Sirius. “No one looked twice at us, did they, Harry?”

Harry glanced between the two of them, obviously uncomfortable. His face was back to being round instead of long like Sirius had charmed it, the dark brown irises had faded into green once more, and the shocking red hair was black again. Small children were mystifying. While Harry had gasped in amazement at Sirius’s own brief transformation, a few words of explanation were all it took to convince Harry that magic was real and that Sirius was a wizard. After the Knight Bus appeared out of nothing and Sirius found them a bed at the tail end, he cast a silencing charm around them and explained quickly what was happening. Sirius told Harry that he had been a friend of his parents and that they were a witch and wizard. Harry simply stared and then grinned with understanding.

Sirius wasn’t entirely honest with Remus regarding his attempt to be unidentifiable, however. The journey north had taken far longer than Sirius would have liked, and all the while, he felt the curious glance of the conductor upon them. There were no other passengers so Sirius might have excused the attention, but it was clear that the conductor knew something was amiss. It didn’t help that Harry stared in awe at just about every bit of magic he saw or that he gasped whenever a tree or a parked car leapt out of the way of the bus.

The Knight Bus let them off a mile from Remus’s cottage, giving Sirius plenty of time to undo their disguises and explain a bit more about the magical world. He couldn’t shake the odd feeling of the conductor’s gaze, however, even after the bus had vanished. Maybe he was just exhausted. It wasn’t like he’d slept much the night before having spent it wrestling in the moonlight with an elated werewolf, so perhaps he was merely jumping at shadows. He wished the nagging thought would go away.

Remus shook his head wearily, and Sirius pitied him. It was probably not the way he would have wanted to spend the morning after the full moon.

“Fine, you’ve taken him from his relatives,” said Remus, rubbing his temple with a knuckle. “Now what? Where are you going to go? You can’t stay here—as soon as anyone realizes he’s gone, Dumbledore will come to ensure I’m not hiding the both of you.”

“Doesn’t he trust you?” Sirius said. Remus was the good boy, the obedient one.

“He does,” admitted Remus. “But his wit surpasses his generosity, and if you’ve disappeared, it wouldn’t take a genius to figure out where you might have gone. He has spies, Sirius. He didn’t decommission them as soon as Voldemort vanished. There’s one in Little Whinging, one who lives close to Petunia. You might have been seen. Once Dumbledore knows Harry has been taken away, there are only a handful of places you might hide.”

Sirius frowned. He hadn’t thought of that. But really, what did it matter? Harry was his responsibility. James and Lily had made him the guardian of their son, and it was Sirius’s fault that they were no longer there to parent him. It was up to him now to do right by Harry as stated by the Potters’ will, and not even Albus Dumbledore would get in the way of that.

“I don’t care—” Sirius started.

“You should care,” snapped Remus. “Sirius, you should _care_ that you’re the most reviled wizard in the country. You told me yourself that Crouch is looking for a reason to throw you back into Azkaban. If you could have just _waited_ , just been a little patient, you probably would have gotten custody in weeks, perhaps even days. Your solicitor managed to free you by spotting a _technicality_ —did you really doubt he’d fail you when it comes to Harry?”

Sirius scowled. “He wouldn’t have tried to help. I’m doing my best, Remus.”

“But this? Is this really what’s best for Harry?”

Harry was so small, so innocent that he almost looked like the baby Sirius had last seen years ago bundled up in Hagrid’s coat. He should’ve convinced Hagrid to give Harry up—he shouldn’t have gone after Peter. The best thing for Harry would have been to take him away and plead his case to Dumbledore, but Sirius had followed his revenge rather than his gut. He’d known when he gave his motorbike to Hagrid that it was a mistake, yet the world had fallen out from under him and he knew he was to be a man on the run anyway. If he could at least take his revenge and rid them all of a traitor, then maybe Harry would have been safer.

Of course, he’d failed. His worst mistake had been letting Harry go, and now he knew that whatever happened, he needed to keep his godson close. They could hide, go abroad, assume new identities. They could hole up at Grimmauld Place—even if Dumbledore suspected it as a sanctuary, there was no way for him or the Ministry to enter without express permission. A Black could enter Number 12 from any fireplace connected to the Floo or even Apparate into the drawing room, but it was nearly impossible for an outsider to even find the front door. It was an abhorrent thought, though, to seek refuge at the one place where he vowed to raze someday, but if it meant that Sirius could keep Harry, he would do anything.

Sirius was about to argue the point when Remus perked up suddenly.

“Did you hear that?” said Remus.

Sirius’s heart pounded as he looked around the room. “No, what?”

“Someone’s just Apparated outside, I think.”

Without thinking, Sirius gathered Harry into his arms and darted towards the fireplace just as there came a soft knock on the door. Remus, who was in no state to do so, wobbled to his feet and plucked the jar of Floo powder from the mantel.

“Listen, Remus, I can’t say when I’ll be back,” said Sirius hurriedly as there was another knock. Instinctually, he knew it must have been Albus Dumbledore. Squeezing Harry who gripped him back with ferocity, Sirius smiled wearily at Remus. “But thanks for putting up with…all of this.”

Remus, despite the urgency of the moment, smiled back and said dryly, “I knew something like this would happen when you wouldn’t stop talking about him.” He nodded towards Harry. “Go, then. I’ll see you when I see you, I suppose.”

“Don’t tell Dumbledore I was here,” said Sirius, tucking his hand into the Floo powder.

Remus rolled his eyes but said nothing.

“All right, Harry,” said Sirius, “hold on tightly to me.”

Sirius grabbed a handful of powder, tossed it into the flames, and said, _“Number 12, Grimmauld Place.”_

-

Sirius stumbled and struggled to hold onto the child in his arms as the Floo spat him out. He wobbled until he set Harry down and steadied himself on the table, waiting for the dizziness to pass. It wasn’t the Floo—it was the culmination of less than a week’s worth of events. Azkaban, St. Mungo’s, Crouch’s office, searching for Remus, quarreling with Remus, confronting Petunia and taking Harry away. Now to escape from Dumbledore and allow Remus to take the hit for Sirius absconding with the Boy-Who-Lived…

Sirius pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead.

“You okay?” Harry asked softly.

Sirius swallowed. He should’ve been the one to ask Harry that. “Yeah, just feeling a bit…under the weather.”

There was no one in the kitchen, not even Kreacher. It was dark, though not pitch black, and Sirius knew his way around with his eyes closed. He shouldered the bag with Harry’s things in it, and went for the small hand, clasping it tightly.

“I’m sorry for the panic,” said Sirius, leading him gently around the table. “There are some people who aren’t very happy I took you from your aunt.”

“Are we in trouble?”

“ _You’re_ not in trouble. I’m the one in trouble, and ah, I’ve been a little…well, I probably shouldn’t have taken you away.”

“Why?”

“Why?” said Sirius. How did he explain that he’d kidnapped a child without saying so? “Er—you have to get permission for these sorts of things. You’ve got to have papers, and I don’t have any.”

“Do I have to go back?” The misery in Harry’s voice made him stop suddenly.

“No,” Sirius said with hard conviction. “You’ll never have to go back there again, I promise.”

“Oh,” said Harry, brightening. “Okay. Is this your house?”

Sirius led him up the stairs that went out to the entryway. He’d never seen the entrance hall look so dark. The lamps were low, and the curtains were sealed tightly over the windows. Had his mother become a vampire since she’d been to see him? It was like creeping into a crypt.

He unsheathed his wand and flicked it at the windows, making the curtains fly open.

“Who’s there?”

The sharp demand echoed down the staircase, and Sirius tilted his head up to see his mother leaning over the balustrade.

It was every shred of his power not to bolt back down the stairs and take the Floo away—anywhere else but here. Memories assaulted him as he beheld her like he had so many times before, standing in the entryway while his mother shrieked at him from above. Icy fear crawled through his heart as he held on tightly to Harry.

Walburga was wearing a deep crimson dressing gown, despite that it was only four o’clock in the afternoon. Her face was plain and her black hair was coiled tightly into a knot at the nape of her neck. The livid expression she wore changed suddenly. It dipped into confusion for a split-second before realization widened her eyes, and finally, her lips stretched into a terrifyingly smug smile.

“Well,” she said. “About time you arrived.” But then her eyes swept over the child at Sirius’s side. “ _What_ is _he_ doing here?”

Sirius felt Harry’s hand clench with terror, so he drew the boy closer.

“Er—Mum, this is Harry. Harry—er—this is my mother. She lives here,” he said.

“That’s—that’s _Potter’s_ boy. The son of that Mudbl—”

Sirius whipped out his wand “Don’t you dare say it. You’ll not say a _word_ about Lily while I’m here.”

Walburga gripped the railing and glowered down at them.

“ _What_ have you done? That boy—do you realize who he is, you imbecile? You cannot bring him into this house!”

Sirius lowered his wand, pocketed it, and knelt in front of Harry who was trying to keep his face impassive. The boy was old enough to realize Walburga was talking about him, and he would understand that she did not want him there.

“We’ll only stay here until I can officially make you my ward, all right, Harry? My mum’s all talk,” he lied, hoping Harry would believe him. “Let’s find you a room. How does that sound? One that’s only yours and not…a cupboard.”

“Did you hear me, Sirius Orion?” Walburga demanded. Her hawkish eyes latched onto them as Sirius led Harry up the staircase.

The rug had worn down and a few days’ worth of dust had settled on the bannister. His gaze flickered to the wall of House-Elf heads mounted on the way up, and before Harry could notice them, he pointed to the top of the staircase.

“Race you?” he said. Harry looked at him quizzically, but then a smile broke and the boy darted the rest of the way. Sirius’s hesitation left him dismally behind, so he skipped a few stairs to catch up, but the distraction worked and Harry missed the House-Elf heads entirely.

When he reached the top, Harry was panting and his face was bright with victory. His grin faded quickly as he tipped his head up at the formidable woman who loomed over him. Harry backed up into Sirius.

Walburga cast one last sour look on them both before curling her lip at Sirius.

“We will have words. Put him up in the room above yours. Once he is settled, you will come down and explain yourself.”

“Explain myself? He’s my godson, and I’m responsible for him. That should be explanation enough, I think. Come on, Harry.”

Harry was only too willing to get away from the witch on the stair and grasped Sirius’s hand again, almost leading the way himself in haste.

The stairs wound up past the floor where Sirius and his brother once had their bedrooms, up to the third landing where a pair of doors faced each other on either side of the dark corridor. Once again, Sirius made the curtains flutter open from afar, and he saw Harry’s face light up in delight at the wave of magic. The delight on the boy’s face filled Sirius’s chest with warmth.

“I’m sorry we’ve got to be here,” said Sirius as he opened the door.

Harry tiptoed after Sirius the room but stopped suddenly. He took in the four poster bed with the dramatic, emerald green hangings with wide eyes that shifted to the massive fireplace and velvet settee beneath the window. Sirius could imagine a worn suitcase poking out from under the bed and the strange foreign smells that hung from the walls whenever his Uncle Alphard returned from some exotic adventure, but now, the room was quite bare.

Not that Harry seemed to notice. Harry stared at the bed.

“Can I sleep there?” he said, pointing.

“Where else, kiddo? The rug?”

Harry approached the bed, reaching a hand out to brush over the coverlet. To Sirius’s annoyance, the little hand came away gray with dust, so he vanished the dust with another wand wave. Even with the dust gone, all Harry seemed capable of was gaping at the bed. Sirius crossed to the bed and flopped down, closing his eyes. He sank into the softness, reveling. How long had it been since he’d laid down in a real bed?

Then his eyes flew open. Had Harry _ever_ slept in a real bed?

“Where are you going to sleep?” Harry asked, still stroking the coverlet.

“I dunno, my room’s downstairs, just under this one—”

“Can you sleep here?” blurted Harry. Then he looked sheepishly at his hands.

Sirius propped himself on his elbows, regarding Harry with a tilted head. “You don’t want your own room?”

Another shrug.

“Well, I can stay with you if you’d like. There’s nothing that’ll hurt you here, though, you know. My mum’s terrifying but she’s the worst thing in the house. I wouldn’t worry about anything else… Well, maybe except for Kreacher, that’s the House-Elf. You’ll see him around, but he won’t hurt you.”

“Can I see your room?”

Sirius grimaced. His old bedroom was definitely not suitable for a small child to see. He thought of the posters he’d placed with permanent sticking charms, several of them a bit inappropriate for Harry’s young eyes. “Er—maybe. I think the door might be locked. We could go to the attic, though, and you can pick out some of the toys my brother and I used to play with.”

“Really?” The coverlet bunched under Harry’s hand in his excitement.

Sirius nodded. “Of course. I think my first broom’s up there too. There’s not a lot of room to fly around, but I always made it work. Oh, and I had animal figurines that walked around and stuff. But we’ll get you your own things too eventually, when we can get out… What sort of things do you like?”

For the first time, it dawned on Sirius that perhaps he couldn’t give Harry a normal childhood any more than Petunia had. They couldn’t go out to a store and purchase things, and he wasn’t sure if that would be any different when his custody over Harry was legitimized. Already Harry was so famous that Remus suggested they would recognize him by his scar, but to add to it that Sirius was the most reviled wizard alive, how could anything be normal for Harry?

They would have to move, he reckoned. Away from London, perhaps find a small town without magical folk and live like Muggles until Sirius could track down Wormtail and clear his name for good.

He felt achingly guilty as he listened to Harry talk about things he liked. The park, birds, dogs, cats (but not Mrs. Figg’s cats apparently), sweets, his diecast car with the missing wheel, trees. Harry deserved a normal childhood, just like Dumbledore insisted to Remus, and what had he done? Dragged Harry from his aunt and uncle to put him through a childhood even more bizarre than the one he’d left.

_But Petunia didn’t love him._

Sirius watched Harry go for the bag they’d brought and one by one, he pulled out the handful of toys to show Sirius. The story behind each one was the same— _Dudley got this one for Christmas but he broke it, Dudley got this for his birthday but he broke it so Aunt Petunia gave it to me._ They were the saddest looking toys he’d ever seen. All of them were missing parts or were dented too much to function properly like a plastic action figure without arms and a robot that was mostly just a head, not that Harry seemed to care. He seemed fairly proud of what he had, which perhaps made it worse. He didn’t bother asking why his aunt and uncle never bought him his own, new things. The boy would be five in a couple of months—he only knew what was presented to him.

No. Petunia had certainly not loved this boy.

That was something particularly confusing to Sirius who regarded the child before him as nothing short of a miracle. Here was a boy who was probably ignored and neglected as long as he could remember, delightfully sharing his possessions with someone he’d just met. Once Harry realized that he could trust Sirius, he hadn’t stopped chattering and Sirius couldn’t stop listening.

James should been here, Sirius thought, another wave of guilt washing over him. It wasn’t fair that Sirius was the first of them to have a real conversation with Harry. Lily should have been the one describing the wild things Harry learned to say. James should have been the one to talk about broomsticks with Harry for the first time. _This is so wrong,_ he thought, forcing a smile. _He’s not_ my _son._

“Is Remus coming here?” Harry asked.

“Oh, no, he won’t be,” said Sirius. “But we can see him again soon if you want.”

“I like his house. He has a lot of pictures that move.”

“He does. Listen, Harry, I hate to do this, but are you all right to be by yourself in here for a bit? I should talk to my mum, and I think it’d be better if I went alone.”

Harry nodded slowly, though he was obviously uncomfortable with the idea. Unfortunately, Sirius thought it a better idea if Harry wasn’t there to hear what his mother had to say.

“It won’t be long,” Sirius assured. “And if you get scared, I’m just downstairs. I’m sure you’ll hear us.”

“Are you going to lock the door?”

“No, of course not. Did your aunt—?” Sirius shook his head. _Of course_ she would lock him in the cupboard. “No, Harry, you can leave whenever you’d like. There’s a toilet right next door if you need it. I’ll be back soon.”

He squeezed the tiny shoulder and went for the door. He knew he shouldn’t have cast a last glance at Harry for a wave—the boy stared at him, wide-eyed as if he wanted more than anything for Sirius to stay.

“I’ll just leave this open,” Sirius said.

Sirius found his mother in the drawing room.

If he hadn’t known any better, she might have been a Victorian portrait the way she languished on the settee in the dramatic lamplight. It was only late afternoon, he thought, marching into her line of sight. The curtains shouldn’t have been closed already. For the fourth time since he’d come back to Number 12, he made the curtains sweep back and let the warm, late spring sunlight stream across his mother’s lap.

“I prefer it dark,” she snapped at him.

Sirius dropped onto the sofa in a way he would have been punished for ten years ago. “I spent three years in the dark,” he said, observing the ceiling. “I’ve had enough of it.”

“Sit up,” she barked.

Sirius turned his head. “I don’t feel like it.”

“Sirius Orion, if you do not sit up this instant, I will personally turn the boy over to the Ministry.”

That made his heartbeat quicken, and suddenly, he realized with a dawning dread that she did have something over him. He thought he avoided the worst of it. Healer Honeycutt saw him mentally fit enough to make his own decisions, and Crouch hadn’t forced him to stay under his mother’s custody, both of which must have enraged Walburga.

Reluctantly, Sirius put his feet on the floor.

A satisfied look gave the impression she was about to smile, though she held off.

“What do you want?” he said.

“For now, only an explanation. After that, we can discuss the finer details of what we will do. First of all, where have you been since you were released from St. Mungo’s?”

Sirius didn’t intend to bring Remus into the mess, so he merely shrugged and said, “A friend put me up for a few nights.”

“Which friend?”

“You don’t know him.”

“And when did you take the boy?”

“This morning.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s my responsibility,” Sirius said, wishing he had a better answer. How could he explain to his mother that Harry had been neglected by his family? How to explain the urgency to remove a child from an abusive home to a woman who thought neglect built character?

“Are you hoping to raise the next Dark Lord? Is that it, Sirius Orion?”

Sirius’s jaw fell open. “Are you mad?”

“Well, I can imagination the temptation. After all, the boy must possess considerable power if he defeated the Dark Lord when he was only an infant. I must warn you, however, Dark Lords come and go, as I’m certain you’ve realized already, but true power is found in family, Sirius, not dark magic.”

“Oh please, you and everyone else in this family has dabbled in _dark magic_ ,” Sirius said, leaning back against the sofa. “Don’t tell me you’re suddenly afraid of it.”

“That sort of power is for the weak of mind,” Walburga said. “Look at your Dark Lord. His concern for blood purity was nothing compared to his lust for power.”

Sirius frowned. “Why d’you think that?”

“He spilled more pure blood than he promised to preserve,” Walburga said scornfully.

Sirius didn’t know why it never crossed his mind that his parents would disapprove of Voldemort’s methods of purifying the world, but it made sense in a disturbing way. Voldemort had taken Regulus away—her precious obedient son. He’d been just another body thrown out of the way of Voldemort’s bloody path, and Blacks didn’t _like_ when their own were tossed aside like rubbish. It was insulting. The family was everything to his parents, and for Voldemort to treat Regulus like he was nothing…

To Walburga, it must have seemed like Voldemort had taken everything from her, and finally, even Sirius. Was that why she came to claim him from Azkaban? Was he the one thing she thought she could get back?

“I’m not…” he might have laughed at the absurdity, “I’m not raising Harry to be the next Voldemort. I promised James I would be Harry’s guardian if anything happened to him and Lily. I’m just fulfilling my promise.”

“Potter is dead,” Walburga said sharply. “You owe him nothing.”

“I owe him everything,” he growled.

“No, you owe your mother as much as you believe you owe that _Potter_. I was the one who had you released from Azkaban. Where would you be right now if I had not? Rotting in that prison cell with hardly a window and a bucket in the corner. Would you prefer I send you back? I had the power to get you out, I certainly have the power to put you back in.”

“What do you want from me?” he said again, rubbing his temple.

“A bit of gratitude would be a good start.”

“I told you not to get me out. This isn’t how I wanted to be free.”

Walburga narrowed her eyes. “How would you prefer it? A formal apology from the Minister herself? Perhaps a headline in the _Daily Prophet_ proclaiming a wrongful imprisonment?”

“It _was_ wrongful, but—”

“Of course it was wrongful!” Walburga exclaimed. “How dare Crouch commit a Black without so much as a trial? It is shameful and insulting!”

“That’s not what I mean,” Sirius said, gritting his teeth. “I’m innocent. I was framed for everything.”

“Obviously,” said Walburga, waving her hand. “That is, of course, the story with which we’ll proceed. Lucius Malfoy claimed the Imperius Curse, but it’s quite an overused excuse, in my opinion. Who should we claim framed you?”

Sirius opened his mouth to blurt out _Peter Pettigrew,_ but the name evaporated on his tongue as a thought occurred to him. Was it wise to show all of his cards so soon? If he were to declare publicly that Wormtail, a wizard known as a martyr who sacrificed his life to bring the despicable Sirius Black to justice, had actually been an ardent follower of Lord Voldemort, Sirius knew he would _never_ earn his reputation back.

The only way he would clear his name was with solid proof, but the only chance he had at producing solid proof was trapping the slimy rat himself, but if Sirius revealed too soon that Wormtail was an Animagus, he would retreat deeper into hiding.

“No one,” he said sourly.

Kreacher chose at that moment to appear in the drawing room bearing a tea and a few scones which he offered to Walburga. Then the elf turned to Sirius with a sneer and reluctantly served him as well.

Sirius eyed his own cup as Walburga sipped hers. Warily, he set it down on the ottoman without drinking.

“Oh please, I haven’t drugged it,” Walburga said, rolling her eyes.

“How do I know that?”

“I haven’t a reason to drug you _yet_.” Her nails, longer than Sirius had ever seen them, drummed against porcelain. “We shall have to call on Mr. Scrivens again, regarding the boy. Despite Potter’s will, you cannot simply waltz in and snatch a child from his blood relatives. I believe they refer to such a thing as abduction. One might have thought Azkaban would have cured you of rashness but it seems you are as thoughtless as you were when you were a boy.”

Mr. Scrivens was the family solicitor, and the man who Sirius had to thank for weaseling him out of Azkaban. If truth were an iron rod, Mr. Scrivens was a skilled blacksmith who could meld and twist it just to the point of breaking, shaping it into something entirely unrecognizable. Sirius doubted the man had ever lied in his life, but he equally suspected that anything Mr. Scrivens claimed was crock of shit.

“I don’t see why he’s got to get involved,” Sirius said, wrinkling his nose. “He’ll just muck up the whole thing. All I’ve got to do is prove that I’m rightfully his guardian.”

“Well, my idiot boy, you’ve kidnapped the Boy-Who-Lived,” said Walburga. “I’m certain Barty Crouch will attempt to charge you with child abduction, and I doubt he’ll find much resistance. He may be waning in popularity, but he’s far more well-liked than _you_ at the moment. If you wish to keep the boy and remain free, Mr. Scrivens is the only hope you have.”

“And what do you want?”

Walburga blinked. “Pardon?”

“Don’t play stupid. What do I have to do in exchange? It’s not _my_ gold that’s paying for Scrivens’ creative services.”

Then a tight smile bowed Walburga’s thin lips as she regarded her son. “It _is_ your gold that is paying for Mr. Scrivens. I’ve had him pull from the heir’s account for the latest expenditures on your behalf.”

“The heir’s account?” said Sirius. “You’ve reversed the disownment?”

“Reversed? My boy, did you think we disowned you?”

Sirius felt his jaw pop open again. “You—you and Dad never—? But—what about _that?”_ He gestured wildly to the tapestry on the opposite wall. It was too far to see clearly, but Alphard had warned that Walburga had burned his name from the family tree after he’d run away.

“Symbolic,” she said bluntly.

“But—but _why?”_ he sputtered.

Then Walburga stood, abandoning her cup on the tea tray. Her robes were dark and dramatic, much like the woman who wore them, and they billowed behind her as she approached Sirius who instinctively leaned away. A pale hand clasped his chin, and Sirius was twelve again, mesmerized and terrified of his mother. The smell of her was the same amber and tonka he remembered, and her fingers just as frigid. Her black eyes glittered.

“You have embarrassed this family time and again, and your shameful actions have sullied the Black name,” she said. A nail pinched what was left of the flesh of his cheek. “You abandoned us in a cowardly fashion that _should_ have meant disownment. _However_ , it does not expunge the blood within you. You are a Black, and despite your reprehensible transgressions, you embody precisely what it means to be a Black.”

Ice spread from his heart through his veins.

“How?” he said, horrified.

“Your brother was weak,” she said. If she hadn’t held him fast, he would have reeled in shock. His _mother_ was decrying her favorite son? “Obedient,” she conceded, “but weak. Intelligent, but a fool and a coward. He only supported the Dark Lord to please us.”

“I take it that didn’t work?” Sirius said.

“But _you_ ,” Walburga went on, squeezing her fingers. “You were always a strong boy. Look at you now—untouched by three years in Azkaban. Crouch’s boy lasted mere months. You are proud and resilient, a Black through and through.”

“You burned me off the tapestry. What do you want?”

“You will resume your duties as heir,” she said. “You will learn to manage the accounts, and by year’s end, you will wed a suitable bride and carry on the Black name.”

“You’re dreaming,” said Sirius, jerking from her hold. _Marry?_ Who did his mother expect to marry him? What sort of psychotic bride would agree to marry a wizard who committed mass murder and spent nearly four years in Azkaban? She would have to be a madwoman and desperate, though to his chagrin, he wouldn’t put it past his mother to find her.

Marriage had never been something Sirius honestly considered once he had run away, though the threat of a wife hung over him before he’d left Grimmauld Place when he was sixteen. His mother would toss around names of girls he’d known and loathed, pointing out traits like modesty and gentle breeding. Once she’d wished that she could wed him before he came of age to a woman who would temper his brashness with her softness, but the only girls within their society that he knew were either intolerably pretentious and cruel or about as interesting as a sponge.

“As long as you remain under this roof, you will do as I say,” said Walburga. She released him. “You are welcome to leave, my son, but understand me: I will have the brat removed from you, and Crouch will send the Aurors to return you to your cell. You will stay here and resume your duties or you will return to Azkaban. Is that clear?”

His tongue felt like sandpaper. The venomous glare he fixed on her did nothing to diminish her smug expression. She knew she had backed him into a corner. There was no doubt she could do it—she’d gotten him out, after all. They would take Harry away and give him back to his aunt who would lock him back in the cupboard with his broken toys, and Sirius would never see him again. Only hours had passed since he’d taken his godson away, but he knew he could never give the child back without feeling like his heart had been wrenched from him too.

His mother’s eyes glittered.

Well, he thought, just because he agreed to something didn’t mean he had to go through with it. He could play her games until the right moment appeared and he escaped from her clutches. He could use the family gold and Mr. Scrivens’ power of litigation until he found his way out. He could put the roof of Number 12 over Harry’s head until another a new place could be bought.

Sirius dragged his gaze from his mother to his hands.

“Fine,” he said.

“Oh, good, I knew you had _some_ sense left,” said Walburga, patting his head. He fought the instinct to slap her away. “Now leave and freshen up. Dinner will be served at seven. You’ll be bathed and dressed properly, and you shall not be late.”

Sirius didn’t waste a moment to leap from the sofa and make for the door. He froze, however, just as he neared the threshold and turned to his mother. While he would have _loved_ to present Harry uninvited to his mother’s table, he feared how Harry would take his mother’s surprised bellows at the presence of a half-blood. It wasn’t fair to subject Harry to that.

“Have Kreacher find some of my old robes and send them up to Harry’s room,” Sirius told Walburga.

Walburga whirled. “Why would I do that?”

“Because I know how you prefer we dress for dinner,” he said. “And I’d hate for Harry to leave you unimpressed, but he hasn’t got any robes yet.”

“That half-blood brat isn’t welcome at my t—”

“Well, it isn’t your table,” Sirius said. “It’s mine. You realize that as heir, I own this house? Grandfather gifted it to Dad, and now that Dad is _dead,_ it’s mine now. Frankly, I’m doing you a favor by allowing you to stay here. Once I’m married, however, I can’t make any promises. After all, I don’t think it would be appropriate, you know, especially since you don’t get on with my godson. I _could_ reconsider, however, if you were to get along with him.”

Walburga’s cheeks blazed. “You dare suggest this house belongs to you? Mr. Scrivens—”

“—has been paid with my gold,” Sirius said, unable to stop his lips from pulling back into a smile. His mind began to tick with possibilities. He loathed this house—he loathed his family, his gold, his status—but he couldn’t deny that leaning into his inheritance gave him an edge. He would still have to play into Walburga’s rules, there was no way around that for now, but there was power in his role.

Perhaps Walburga had never stopped to consider that he would embrace it. In her favor, she wasn’t wrong. As long as it suited him, he could use his title to his advantage, and as soon as he discovered a way out of her web, he would abandon it. 

Years ago, before James and Lily died, he would have done anything not to step foot in his childhood home again. That was before the world had stripped him of everything—his pride, his friends, his freedom. There was almost nothing left of what he had built since the day Professor McGonagall had placed the Sorting Hat on his head, and now he knew, he would never get all of it back if he didn’t abandon some of his old principles.

There was no place to escape this time. James was gone. Remus couldn’t protect him. Dumbledore thought him a murderer.

Harry needed him, and if Sirius needed to sacrifice a few values to give Harry the life he deserved, then Sirius considered it a worthy cost.


	4. Chapter Four

* * *

**Chapter Four**

* * *

The robes were in fairly decent condition. Sirius smoothed the lapel and brushed off a bit of dust from Harry's shoulder.

Harry shuffled from foot to foot, cocking his head as he beheld himself in the mirror. He was a very small boy, Sirius knew, though he only really had Petunia's oversized son for comparison. Sirius never had much to do with children, but he could see plainly that Harry was particularly tiny for a child. Kreacher had procured an old set of robes that might have belonged to either Sirius or Regulus at Harry's age. They draped on the floor until Sirius shortened them with a shrinking charm.

"How do you feel?" Sirius said, still kneeling before Harry.

Harry shrugged.

"Well, you've only got to wear them when we eat."

"Why?"

"Because Mum likes a formal dinner," he explained. How strange it must have been for Harry to have slept the night before in a cupboard under the stairs and face a formal dinner in the evening. Harry had probably never seen wizarding robes before.

Sirius had bathed and changed after checking on Harry and returned as quickly as he could to get Harry fitted into something that wouldn't make his mother scream. Harry marveled at Sirius's clothing. The robes his mother sent to his room were a bit ridiculous—they were midnight blue again, but these were embroidered with silver on the cuffs and lapels. Harry gawked when Sirius came in, and only when Sirius collapsed again on the bed with a grunt did Harry relax.

Now that Harry was dressed, Sirius glanced at the unruly mess of hair. It was no use trying to get it to stick down. James's father had invented a potion to cure the Potters of their wild hair, but it seemed to be a miracle only to others. Potter hair was simply untamable, and Harry had not been gifted his mother's shining locks. The back of Harry's hair even stood up just like James's.

"She doesn't like me," said Harry, though he didn't seem entirely glum about it. He simply stated it like a fact.

"That's not true," Sirius argued. "She just doesn't know you. But listen, Harry, you're the guest of honor tonight. You get to sit by me and eat whatever you like. You must remember one thing, however."

Harry stared at him. "What?" he whispered.

"You are _my_ godson, and you don't have to listen to anyone else but me."

They made it to the dining room with only a few seconds to spare. Mrs. Black had taken a seat at the head of the table which left the chairs on either side of her empty. Sirius froze, hand tight on Harry's shoulder as he saw the table settings and realized his first promise to Harry would be broken already.

"I thought Harry might sit next to me," Sirius said, eyeing his mother.

"He'll sit here." Mrs. Black indicated the setting on her left.

Harry cast Sirius a wary glance, but at Sirius's reassuring look, he went for the seat. Sirius paused, watching the boy climb onto the chair. He was so small that he hardly seemed tall enough to reach the table. However, a charm that Sirius remembered well made the chair grow a few inches until Harry was sitting at an appropriate height.

For a moment, Sirius wondered if it had been a mistake to subject Harry to this. When Sirius was a child, he and Regulus were seldom invited to the table until he was six. Perhaps Harry was nearly the same age as Regulus when he began to dine with the rest of the family, but Regulus had always been the obedient, golden child his mother would rarely deign to punish. Harry was…potentially everything his mother hated.

However, to his relief, Harry was also _quiet_.

Mrs. Black's eyes snapped to Sirius. "Well?" she said.

"Merely admiring the table settings," he said before finding his seat.

Food appeared, and inwardly, Sirius groaned. A clear broth filled his bowl, and he realized his mother wasn't going to make this easy on him. It wouldn't simply be a shovel-everything-in-his-mouth-and-go sort of affair. Mrs. Black had intended a full-course dinner.

Sirius glanced at Harry who stared at the bowl in wonderment, though he noticed Harry hadn't reached for a spoon. Mrs. Black glared down at him.

"Is there something wrong?" she barked. "Why aren't you eating, boy?"

Harry's surprised face softened as he reached for the spoon and silently dipped it into his bowl. Mrs. Black turned her suspicious gaze to Sirius.

"Don't shout at him," he said. "And he's got a name, you know."

Mrs. Black sniffed. "It isn't proper for a child his age to be dining with us."

"It isn't _proper_ for you to sit at the head of the table," he pointed out. "We're bending a few rules this evening."

Mrs. Black's white lips pressed together, locking away her thoughts as smugly, Sirius sipped.

Though he had eaten a number of meals since released from Azkaban, none of them matched the flavor of blasted Kreacher's broth, loath as he was to admit it. All of his concentration went into keeping himself from pouring it down his throat and asking for more. If Mrs. Black hadn't continued to ask him bland questions, he might have lost the battle.

When the soup course was through, there appeared before Mrs. Black and Harry a colorful assortment of vegetables and glistening roast mutton, but Sirius frowned as a slightly thicker broth appeared before himself.

"Why is mine different?" he said.

"You need to regain your strength," said Mrs. Black. "You will have restorative broths until I see an improvement on your constitution."

Sirius sputtered. "So I don't get to eat anything? How's that supposed to help me?"

"You can't expect to simply eat the way you used to in your condition, Sirius Orion," said Mrs. Black. "Broths first. Your healer sent over the potions for you until you've regained a bit of weight. Until then, I fear a meal like this—" she nodded to her own plate "—would do you far more harm than good."

"Potions?" said Sirius, eyeing his bowl apprehensively.

Mrs. Black waved her hand. "Oh, I haven't poisoned you quite yet. You will have to be a bit more defiant to warrant that sort of attention," she remarked with a smirk.

Dinner was to be a long affair indeed.

Sirius tried to ignore his fury as he drank his broth. He was itching for a fight. The cage of Grimmauld Place was shrinking and shackling him in place as freedom slipped further from his grasp. He wanted to storm out. He wanted to curse his mother, set fire to the drapes, and never look back. If it hadn't been for Harry's protection, he would never have looked on this house again but here he was, dressed in formal robes and quietly sipping his meal while he struggled to keep his rage confined to his own thoughts. At least in Azkaban, he could scream as much as he liked if he wanted or transform into Padfoot and soothe his complex emotions, but here, there was only silent fury.

"I have invited Mr. Scrivens here to discuss your situation," said Mrs. Black. "If you insist on this path, we might as well have the law on our side. Did you say that Potter made a will?"

"Of course he made a will," Sirius said.

"And you are absolutely certain _you_ are the appointed guardian?" she said doubtfully.

Sirius glanced at Harry who was staring at the assortment of golden forks. Under the table, Sirius waved his wand which made the correct fork wiggle. Harry grinned at it. Sirius smiled at the boy, reminding himself that he couldn't lose his calm in front of Harry.

" _Yes,_ " said Sirius. "I was made godfather before he was even born."

"Is there a godmother?"

"Yeah, but she won't be claiming him," said Sirius.

Mrs. Black frowned. "Well, who is it? If we can lift the responsibility from your hands _and_ keep him from those Muggles, we might as well try."

Sirius grit his teeth. "She's not in any state to take him in. Trust me."

"Nonsense, we'll write her. We can even offer gold so she might hire a nanny. What is her name?"

"I'm telling you, she won't take him—"

"Sirius Orion, tell me who she is this instant," said Mrs. Black. Her high-pitched voice made Harry's face go blank. "If we can wash our hands of this boy—"

Sirius let his spoon drop into the bowl with a clatter as he glared at her. "It's Alice Longbottom, all right?"

Mrs. Black at the very least had the shame to press her lips together. How widely known what had happened to Frank and Alice Longbottom, Sirius wasn't sure, but he couldn't imagine it would escape the collective knowledge of pureblood society. According to Remus, Bellatrix and her lot had been responsible for it, as if there wasn't already enough shame against the Black family. The Longbottoms were respected, pureblooded Aurors. Even amongst the highest echelons of society, such an offense could hardly be overlooked. After all, the horrific crime had prohibited the birth of more pureblooded children in a world where such a thing was quickly becoming an endangered species.

"Well, I suppose you're right," said Mrs. Black. "Now that August Longbottom, she already looks after that son of theirs, doesn't she? Perhaps she would like a little… _friend_ for the boy."

"You either get me and Harry, Mum, or you don't get me at all," said Sirius, already exhausted from the conversation.

Mrs. Black's nostrils flared. Instead of retaliating, her eyes swiveled to land on Harry who was watching the exchange as he took tiny bites of food.

"Sit up, boy," she snapped. "You aren't a street urchin. Is this how the Boy-Who-Lived eats, shoveling food into his mouth like an animal?"

"Don't _talk_ to him like that!" Sirius said, rising.

Mrs. Black waved her hand dismissively. "How else will he learn?"

"You can't just scream at people to make them do what you want them to do—"

"Can't I? Look at him now, he's just fine."

Harry had straightened his back a little, yet there was no trace of the fear that Regulus used to wear whenever Mrs. Black shouted at them. In fact, Harry seemed completely unperturbed that a practical stranger had raised her voice and scolded him quite loudly, and it occurred to Sirius that Mrs. Black's sort of guardianship was the kind with which Harry was quite familiar. How many times had Petunia and Vernon Dursley hollered at him at the dinner table? How often had Harry been punished for eating in a particular way? How different was Mrs. Black from the guardians of Number Four, Privet Drive?

But Harry _should_ have been afraid of Mrs. Black. He _should_ have burst into tears when she yelled at him. Harry should have had no idea how to handle a stranger berating him, yet there he sat, silently taking it.

Sirius had no memories of being a child under six at the same table, yet stories from his uncle informed him that he'd been a defiant, rebellious boy who would sooner do the opposite of what he was told than obey his mother. Regulus, however, accepted Mrs. Black's reproach with glistening tears and a trembling chin to Sirius's embarrassment. Something about Harry's response was much worse than either of those, however. A child who was nearly five probably should have not been so compliant.

Mrs. Black smugly withdrew her gaze from Harry and went back to eating.

Oh no, she did not get to have the last word on Harry's _discipline._

Sirius opened his mouth to retort but Mrs. Black pointed her index finger and aimed it at him as if it were a wand.

"Eat," she snapped.

"I have something to say," he said with a sneer.

"As you always do. Take my advice, Sirius Orion, and learn to discipline the boy now or you will _never_ have an influence on his behavior."

Sirius couldn't his lips curling into a smirk. "You are, of course, the expert on children's behavior."

"Well, some children simply can't be helped," said Mrs. Black. "No matter how many restrictions we placed on you, there was nothing your father and I could do to break that rebellious spirit of yours. We could only seek to tame it. Luckily, Azkaban seems to have tempered it _slightly._ "

"Imagine what might've happened if you'd just let me be," Sirius said, scowling.

"I needn't imagine. Narcissa's boy is what you might have been if we simply let you behave however you liked."

Sirius had forgotten about Narcissa and Lucius Malfoy's child—a boy born a few years after their wedding, late enough into their marriage that polite society wondered if there was something wrong with the seemingly perfect couple. It wasn't hard to envision what Narcissa would be like as a mother. She had practiced for years on Regulus by dragging him around at parties and family gatherings, showing him off, combing his black curls, dressing him, and telling him how smart he looked. What her son would be like, Sirius shivered at the thought. Maybe he would be the pureblood equivalent of Dudley Dursley. Silently, he vowed never to let the little Malfoy spawn within twenty feet of Harry.

"Well, I think Harry's had enough of your brand of parenting," said Sirius. "As have I. If you don't mind, I'll decide how to raise Harry seeing as _I_ am his guardian. Should I need someone to berate him and make him feel ashamed of himself, you needn't worry—I'll find you."

"You cannot be his friend, you know," Mrs. Black told him. "He needs a disciplinarian, not a _chum_."

The word _chum_ seemed humorous, and Sirius couldn't help a small grin. Harry caught his eye with a shy smile. Well, why couldn't they be chums? After all, they had more in common with each other than with any of their peers, and Sirius knew he'd never be the sort of parent who hounded his kid into submission. It wasn't like he'd let Harry get away with everything like Narcissa and Petunia did with their sons, but he rather thought Harry deserved a little bit of leniency considering everything he'd been through.

Dinner outlasted Sirius's energy to quarrel with his mother, and he wondered if she was right that Azkaban had tempered him _slightly_. Certainly, he wanted to argue and give her concrete examples of how deplorable she was as a mother, but he was feeling so tired. Not sleepy—he didn't believe she'd had Kreacher sneak a potion in his food—just exhausted.

He never thought he'd come back to Grimmauld Place. When he was sixteen, he promised himself that he would do anything not to cross the threshold ever again, yet here he sat, cowed by his mother at the dinner table once more.

When finally it was over, Sirius coaxed Harry—whose eyelids were drooping—from the table. The small fingers curled over Sirius's and it was all he could do not to lift the boy into his arms and carry him out, but he would not rob Harry of the dignity of walking from the dining room himself. Mrs. Black ignored them, draining the last of her wine as they left. Out of Mrs. Black's sight, Sirius picked Harry off his wobbly legs and carried him up the stairs.

Putting Harry to bed was far easier than Sirius remembered when he was a baby. Although he had to convince Harry to brush his teeth ( _"Do you want your teeth to look like mine?"_ Sirius pointed out), getting Harry to change out of the robes and into his threadbare pajamas wasn't hard at all. Of course, Sirius helped him peel off the layers of the dress robes, but Harry was more than willing to collapse into bed without a fuss. Only when Sirius bid him goodnight with a reluctant kiss to the forehead did Harry protest.

"Wait!" said Harry.

Sirius turned. "Everything all right?"

"It's just…could…could you sleep here?"

Sirius remembered Harry asking the same thing earlier, and part of him was tempted to change into Padfoot and sleep beside the boy. However, he wasn't sure how well Harry could keep a secret just yet and he definitely couldn't let his mother find out that he was an Animagus.

Behind him in the corner was a plush little chair, still covered in dust. Sirius dragged it over anyway and sank into it, promising Harry that he'd stay until he fell asleep. Although Harry was disappointed that Sirius would be gone eventually, he had slipped into slumber within minutes.

Sleep did not come as easily for Sirius as it did for Harry.

The room across the way was untouched and filthy from disuse, and it occurred to him that maybe he should've taken Harry's offer and slept in his bed. But it was too late now, and he didn't want to wake Harry, so he got to work clearing the bed of dust. Once he drew back the covers, he heard something scuttle past his feet.

Sirius didn't mind the filth having lived in a putrid cell for three years. The vermin, however, was something else. Other than fleas in the blankets, most vermin tended to avoid the forbidding fortress of Azkaban. In his time there, Sirius could only recall seeing a handful of mice or rats, and that was before he'd gotten desperate enough to make a meal of one. He'd not considered that his childhood home would be less maintained than Azkaban, and he was a bit leery of what else he'd find in the sheets. He was itching to transform into Padfoot who didn't mind the idea of doxies or spiders as much as the human Sirius Black, but he couldn't chance Kreacher sneaking in to poison his drinking water and discovering the dog sleeping in the bed.

He stripped off the navy robes and went in search of something to wear from the wardrobe. When the heavy oak door swung open, chittering alerted him that doxies had taken residence in the cold darkness. Carefully, he eyed the dressing gowns and pajamas, unsure if it were wise to put garments that once belonged to a dead relative. There was something about wearing his father's old pajamas that made his blood freeze, so he merely plucked a regal black and grey striped dressing gown from a hanger and shut the wardrobe before the doxies swarmed. Although it had a musty smell to it, Sirius thought it seemed clean. At least if Harry needed him for some reason, he could throw it on.

Slipping into bed with not much on except underwear, Sirius gingerly rested his head on the pillow, easing into it for fear that something might have been living there. Satisfied that it was devoid of any critters, he let his eyes slide shut.

Then the thoughts began.

What happened to Remus when he left? Was it Dumbledore after all? He'd received no word via owl or Floo suggesting that Dumbledore was on his way to Grimmauld Place to take Harry, and there were no Ministry officials swarming the house, as far as he knew. Of course, no one would be able to enter, and Sirius was quite sure his mother would have mentioned if Number Twelve were surrounded by Aurors. Yet Remus had said nothing so far, and Sirius feared he might implicate his friend if he tried contacting him too soon.

Maybe Crouch would see his actions as a criminal offense and chuck him back into Azkaban. Sirius didn't care what happened to himself but what would happen to Harry if they were separated?

Lacing his fingers behind his head, he stared into the darkness of the canopy, cognizant that this was the first time he had slept in a bed in several years. He pictured Harry in the large guestroom as a little lump on a big bed, and he thought about how it was Harry's first time sleeping in a real bed _ever._ No, Harry couldn't go back to Petunia and her husband.

Despite the soft warmth of a bed, his mind was riddled all night with quarreling thoughts about the stupidity of his own actions against a sense of righteousness.

"You'll look after him, won't you, Padfoot?"James had asked once.

Sirius had already been made godfather months earlier, but it was far more real the first time he cradled the delicate little person. He frowned at James. "What d'you mean? What's wrong?"

"Just if…you know, something should happen."

"Nothing's going to happen," said Sirius.

"But Sirius, if it did," James said. He glanced at his sleeping wife. For a moment, Sirius was struck by how young she looked—they were all hardly out of Hogwarts, barely even twenty, and now his best mate was asking him if he'd take in his kid.

Sirius swallowed and shifted, the baby in his arms perfectly silent. It seemed like a dumb question at the time because the baby felt like his already. He'd accepted his role as third parent far before that moment, but it felt now like James knew something that he didn't. Did James have an inkling that he wouldn't live to see Harry's second birthday? That he and his wife would be dead within a year and a half?

"If anything happens, I'll raise him like my own kid," Sirius told him.

That satisfied James.

Sirius had failed him once, but he would not fail James again.

* * *

"You've put yourself in a very awkward position, Mr. Black. This is nearly as uncomfortable as the Muggle-baiting case," said Mr. Scrivens.

"This isn't the same as Muggle-baiting!" snapped Sirius. "I am just claiming guardianship over my godson. Is that a crime?"

"Yes," Mr. Scrivens said dryly. "It is. The way you've gone about it, I'm afraid the Ministry won't be pleased. If you would consider returning the boy to his relatives before word spreads of what you've done, you may have a chance of guardianship, though I can't make any promises. We must not forget that you were accused of partaking in the murder of his parents—I do not believe that helps you."

"But I'm innocent," Sirius said, gripping the arms of the chair in an attempt to keep himself from standing and pacing the room. "My record was expunged. Healer Honeycutt said I was mentally stable or whatever. I'm not bringing Harry back to his aunt. She kept him in a _cupboard_."

"As you have reminded Mr. Scrivens several times, Sirius Orion," said Mrs. Black, rolling her eyes from where she sat on the settee.

Mr. Scrivens, too, seemed to grow weary of Sirius's details of what he saw in Little Whinging as if he couldn't see what was so terrible about storing a child in a cupboard like an old coat. Mr. Scrivens and Mrs. Black happened to be the very last people who knew much about rearing children despite the fact that between them, they had raised five of them. Sirius had seen Scrivens's runty little children at Hogwarts—they were a few years younger than him and pale enough that he wondered now if Scrivens had kept _them_ in cupboards too.

These were the people on his side, Sirius thought ruefully. His mother's influence on their world had shriveled with the deaths of her husband and youngest son and virtually vanished with his own incarceration. Instead of a powerful matriarch from an old family, she had become a recluse clinging to the dream of seeing her house survive into the next decade with a new heir. How hungrily she watched him when she thought he didn't notice. Never in his life had she looked at him that way. It made the hairs on his arms prickle.

Mr. Scrivens, on the other hand, was far too pragmatic. How could Scrivens think that Sirius would dump Harry back into an abusive home for even a minute? There was no way to know how long a request for guardianship would take to be processed; bureaucracy could dig in its heels for years. Sirius couldn't wait that long knowing Harry was trapped in a place where he was clearly neglected and had never been shown love. He would disappear with the boy on the Continent or even the United States if he was forced to give Harry back. Harry could attend Beauxbatons or Ilvermorny if it meant that he never had to spend another night sleeping in a cupboard.

Neither Mrs. Black nor Mr. Scrivens understood how Sirius felt about Harry. To them, the boy was merely baggage—an unnecessary complication. Mrs. Black believed that Sirius intended to foster the next Dark Lord while Mr. Scrivens had hinted that he thought Sirius planned to raise Harry like it were a final insult to James Potter and Albus Dumbledore. They didn't get it.

Harry was everything. When he was born, Sirius felt as if he'd become a father himself. Lily joked that Sirius was so adamant about taking care of Harry that she felt like the most well-rested new mother in the world. Sirius came over in the middle of the night to sweep the upset baby from his exhausted parents. He changed his diapers, fed him, dangled toys in front of him until he cracked a gummy smile. Harry may not have been his own son, but he was the most important thing in the world, and he wasn't about to give that up now.

"I'm reminding both of you," Sirius said between clenched teeth. "How can you sit there and for a moment believe it's normal for a child to be treated like that? Not even _you_ kept me in a cupboard."

Mrs. Black's lips pulled back in an uncharacteristic snarl. "Not even I? You dare to compare me to a _muggle?_ "

He stared at her. "Is that why neither of you is surprised?" said Sirius. "Do you think that's how muggles treat their children?"

Mr. Scrivens shifted uncomfortably in the chair as Mrs. Black raised her eyebrows at him. Sirius could have screamed at them. Obviously, they considered muggles no better than brutes who whelped children and kept them in cages until they were grown enough to look after themselves.

The moment lasted only a moment longer until Mr. Scrivens glanced at Mrs. Black.

"We ought to begin rebuilding his image as a respectable member of society," he said as if his silence hadn't just confirmed that he thought that muggles were simply a society of beasts. "Your niece, Mrs. Malfoy, might be a good place to start. Her husband wields significant influence within the Ministry."

By the sour expression on Mrs. Black's face, Sirius saw that she liked the idea as little as he did.

"I'm not associating with Death Eaters," Sirius said.

"Lucius Malfoy was cleared of all charges," said Mr. Scrivens. "You needn't worry about that. Association with a respectable family will show successful reintegration with society, Mr. Black. The Malfoys are a superb start."

Sirius hadn't spoken to his cousin Narcissa since he attended Hogwarts. Both she and her future husband had been prefects when he first started school, and though they were usually content to ignore that he existed, Sirius recalled times when their friends would target him for hexing practice. Narcissa and Malfoy had wed not long after they left school in an event that even Aunt Lucretia complained was far overblown. Sirius attended the wedding at his mother's threat of dismemberment, and the last time he'd seen his cousin, she was drowning in a giant white dress.

"No," said Sirius. "They're not. I'm not going to ingratiate myself to people who think my godson is an abomination."

"The effort would be futile anyway," said Mrs. Black. "Narcissa is already embarrassed by Sirius. Innocent or not, he has spent far too much time in prison and he has completely lost all respectability."

"Arguable that I ever had it," Sirius said.

"Indeed," she agreed.

Mr. Scrivens' lips pressed into a white line as he looked from Mrs. Black to Sirius, his thinly veiled annoyance evident in the stiffness of his lower lids. It occurred to Sirius that Mr. Scrivens was probably used to the Blacks and their infuriating inability to simply do as he said. But that was not why the Blacks employed one of the wiliest solicitors in the country. They weren't paying him to obey him. Mr. Scrivens was paid his weight in gold for his expertise in allowing the Blacks to behave however they wished while he cleaned up their messes.

Resigned, Mr. Scrivens sighed and gathered himself, straightening his robes as he stood, shaking his head. It was a rather comforting sight. Rarely had Sirius seen Mr. Scrivens depart from Grimmauld Place with a relieved look on his face. Usually, he wore an expression of weary resolve as he expelled a hefty exhalation before he bid them farewell.

It was no different today.

"I'll see what I can do about the boy," said Mr. Scrivens.

And then he left without the expectation that Kreacher would see him out, and once he was gone, Sirius got to his feet, knowing that Harry was upstairs alone.

"Where are you going?" said Mrs. Black.

"Upstairs."

"You haven't been excused."

Sirius rolled his eyes. "It's my house."

"Not yet. You will sit until I allow you to leave, Sirius Orion."

He could feel the press of his wand against his leg within the pocket of his robes, and a quick look told him that hers sat beside her on the settee. If he reached for it, she would draw hers faster and disarm him. As a rule, he could not be wandless around her for it was the only thing that kept him from being a prisoner in this house. He even slept with a hand curled around it for fear that she or Kreacher might sneak in and snatch it from him.

"Take that smirk off your face," she snapped. "You are under a grave misconception that this house belongs to you. Do not mistake me, my son, this house is mine until I am dead, and you are to follow my rules while you take refuge here. When I tell you to sit, you will sit. You may leave a room when I excuse you. There will be no pretense about who the head of this family is, do you understand?"

"How does Grandfather feel about you usurping his title?" said Sirius. "He's not dead yet, is he?"

"Your grandfather gave up his duties before your father passed," Mrs. Black said. "He requested that I take them up due to his advanced age, which means that _I_ am effectively the head of the House of Black. Believe me, Sirius Orion, that you would not dare show so much cheek to your grandfather if he were in my place. Not only would you be confined to your room, perhaps even your bed, but you would never see that Potter brat again. You might show me a bit of gratitude."

"For blackmailing me into breeding?"

"If that is what it takes to bring you into line, so be it," she said.

"Bring me into line? If you wanted to do that, you should've left me in Azkaban. You can't control me—you never could. Don't you remember?"

"Only because I had nothing to keep you here," said Mrs. Black.

That was true. If Sirius thought for a minute that he had a better chance at keeping Harry safe somewhere else, they never would have come in the first place, but there was no residence in the country with more security than Number 12, Grimmauld Place. The wards that Mr. Black had built over the years made the house unplottable and practically impregnable, and Sirius would be a fool to consider anywhere else to hide his godson—and she knew it.

Sirius smiled nastily at her. "You know, I feel a bit sorry for you."

The way her jaw stiffened indicated that she knew he was setting her up, but couldn't resist the challenge. She narrowed her eyes. "I see no reason for _you_ to pity _me_. I am not the one who has spent the last handful of years alone in prison, a victim of my own arrogance."

"You don't think so? Then what do you call the last four years? Convalescence? You've been alone this whole time, cooped up in the dark here. What've you been doing? Who's even left? Narcissa, but you don't seem to want her company anymore. Arcturus, but you're afraid of him—"

Mrs. Black stood abruptly, fingers curling over her wand. "I am _not afraid—_ "

"You've always been afraid of him," said Sirius. "What does it matter, though? You're alone. You've been alone ever since Dad and Regulus died. You have no one to bully anymore because the only people who stuck around _had_ to. Can you honestly say that anyone else has come around to call who wasn't expected to? That's why you got me out of Azkaban. Not because you care about me, but because you're pathetically lonely."

Mrs. Black's face colored. "I am the only one who came to see you," she said her voice nearly a hiss. "None of your friends nor your beloved Dumbledore. They left you to rot without a single doubt to the truth of what you've done. Don't you see, Sirius Orion? This is _your_ legacy. I chose to refuse visitors because I required time to recuperate from the distress of losing my husband and son, but you had no opportunity to refuse anyone. If you had not been such a cruel, arrogant boy, perhaps someone might have come to free you. If not for me, you would have died in that putrid little cell."

"Someone would have come eventually," Sirius said. He'd told himself that again and again, a tiny seed of hope that warmed his thoughts before the dementors snatched it away. _Dumbledore will come, Remus will come,_ he had thought almost daily.

Yet a self-assured smile curled her lips. "Perhaps," said Mrs. Black as if Sirius were a child who still believed in Father Christmas.

Heat was now building in his cheeks. "I dedicated my whole life to fighting Voldemort. You have no idea what I've done."

"Apparently no one else has either," she said. "You were imprisoned without a trial—"

"Because Crouch was—"

"You don't suppose Albus Dumbledore, Chief Warlock, might have exercised his influence and persuaded the Wizengamot to give you a trial if he believed you deserved it? He must have considered it a waste of time."

"I nearly died on several occasions for—"

"—for a fool who would cast you aside for his own gain?" suggested Mrs. Black. "Dumbledore has no love for you, Sirius Orion, and never did he. He is no better than the Dark Lord. You were a tool. Once you outlasted your usefulness, he cast you aside. Without Potter, what use are you to him?"

Sirius swallowed. "What d'you mean?"

"You followed Potter like a dog," she said, her words making him shiver. She couldn't have known about his Animagus form, could she? "If it hadn't been for him, would you have supported Dumbledore at all?"

"Of course I would've—"

"I don't think so," said Mrs. Black. "You eschewed your family's values for Potter's because you craved his attention. Without him, you have nothing but outright defiance for convention. All you ever wanted was to rebel. Potter was the antithesis to everything that we as a family represent, and it was intoxicating, was it not? Wherever Potter went, you were sure to follow. And now you've decided to raise his spawn despite that you have nothing to give the child."

"He's my responsibility," said Sirius.

"He is not," Mrs. Black said. "You are incapable of looking after yourself. How do you expect to raise a child without Potter telling you exactly what you ought to do? Those muggles had it perfectly under control, and you thought you might do better by kidnapping the boy?"

"They didn't have it under control, they were keeping him in a cupboard! If I'd known, I would've broken out of Azkaban and kidnapped him sooner!"

"Maybe we should have kept you in a cupboard to dampen your arrogance," said Mrs. Black, her eyes glittering. "Though I suppose if Azkaban couldn't do the trick, there must not be a cure for you. You are totally impetuous. Thoughtless, irresponsible. You are no more than an untamable child yourself. How do you expect to raise that ill-bred brat on your own?"

"I took care of him when he was a baby," said Sirius indignantly. "He's older now! It can't be much harder than it was then. Besides, he's too shy to raise any sort of trouble, so much so that I could hardly convince him to sleep in a bed. I don't think he'll be difficult to look after."

"It isn't the boy who will be the difficult party in this situation," Mrs. Black said, all trace of amusement gone. She cast a long look at Sirius, pausing to draw a breath before she swept her robes from beneath her as she lowered back down to the sofa. Dark eyes, so like Regulus's, stared up at him with unfathomable emotion and for a moment, Sirius could almost imagine that she was the one who pitied him. It lasted only seconds, her brief, personal allowance of emotion other than spite or fury. Within moments, her face tightened again.

Sirius clenched his fists at his sides, struggling not to stalk forward. "You don't think I can handle it?"

"No," she said bluntly. "I do not. After all, rearing even a well-behaved child is a herculean effort. It requires a strong sense of self and an iron will."

"Speaking from experience…" drawled Sirius. "Though perhaps I should seek advice from some other mother? Considering the fact that your youngest son is dead, his death likely a result of an attempt to impress you, and the other is…well, me. If we're discussing legacies, I suppose we should address the fact that centuries of inbreeding and draconian style child-rearing has led us to the end of the Black line." Mrs. Black's mouth parted as she went to retort, but Sirius spoke over her, waving his hand. "Right, I know, my record has been expunged and we have our little deal, but you can't force me to produce a new heir."

Mrs. Black's lips pulled back in a grimace. "Then just _who_ will inherit the House of Black when you and I are no longer here? You would really see it go to a Malfoy than remain in our family's hands?"

Sirius shrugged, though a part of himself that he liked to keep hidden also felt disgusted at the idea. The Malfoys had come from Normandy like the Blacks in the eleventh century, and while they were a family that came in and out of fashion with the years, they had always been known as people who were voraciously greedy. Just about every pureblood family had a leech of a Malfoy hanging off its elbow, sucking galleons here and there, adding to their bloated Gringotts vault. Like the Blacks, there was only a handful of them left, but they had their fingers in a dozen inheritances around the country. Maybe he didn't care what happened to House of Black but it seemed strangely grotesque that the Malfoys should end up with the Black fortune once he died.

But maybe he could write his own will, one that altered the line of succession to someone outside of the family entirely. He glanced at the ceiling as if he could see Harry through the crown molding and the floorboards. Well…if anyone deserved it…

Mrs. Black followed his gaze. As if she could read his mind, she leapt to her feet, drawing her wand menacingly. Her pale fingers gripped her wand with such ferocity, Sirius thought she might even snap it.

"That half-blood disgrace will _never_ inherit House of Black! I would return to haunt this place and burn it down if so!"

"Well, you know as well as I that ghosts don't work like that," said Sirius. "And you can't interfere with what I do with the inheritance if you're dead. The truth is, Mum, if you want me to be heir, then you'll have to realize that things are going to change, mostly in ways that you'll hate and won't be able to stop. Let me go, let me be who I am, and you can leave Grimmauld Place and all of its horrors to whomever you'd like. The choice is yours."

"You will marry by year's end," Mrs. Black said, voice low. "That was your promise."

"Yeah, but what are you going to do after you shove some poor girl on me? Press your ear against the door each night and yell at us to get it on?"

Mrs. Black's face reddened. "You are disgusting. A wretched, disgusting, ungrateful child! I should never have fetched you from Azkaban!"

"No," agreed Sirius. "You shouldn't have, but here we are. Either accept the fact that I'm here now—the same son I always was—or face the embarrassment of having me reincarcerated. Which shame is more palatable?"

Her hand, shaking with fury, lowered her wand back to her side as she cast one long, blazing look at him.

"Neither will eclipse the shame I possess in being forced to mother a son like you," said Mrs. Black. Then she surprised him and swept past, out of the drawing-room and disappearing into the corridor, her heels clicking away as she left him standing alone, heart pounding.

* * *

"He isn't happy," said Remus. "And I don't think he's convinced that we haven't been in contact."

"You didn't tell him, did you?"

"No, but you know how he is."

By the uneasy look on Sirius's face, even flickering in the flames, it was clear he understood. Albus Dumbledore was a skilled Legilimens, and though Remus had developed his own proficiency in Occlumency, he feared it wasn't enough to mask the very obvious fact that Sirius had been a guest in his home for several days.

They should have been more careful. Sirius shouldn't have made the sofa into a makeshift bed or discarded clothes so carelessly around the room. Sirius should have remained as a dog when he slept, in case someone happened to pop by and glance in the windows. He was quite certain now that Sirius was an innocent man—one guilty only of catastrophic misjudgment, but Remus recognized the wisdom in keeping their association a secret, and he could only imagine Dumbledore's profound disappointment if he discovered they had renewed their friendship.

The morning's _Daily Prophet_ headline alarmed the public that Harry Potter had been removed from his family's custody into that of Sirius Black's. A sickening feeling had welled in Remus's stomach all day while he toiled away at work and returned to his cottage that evening. He ate a bit of rice but couldn't force down anything else before he waited in front of the fireplace, knowing Sirius would call him on the Floo eventually. Hours stretched as Remus reread the front page and waited for his friend's face to appear in the flames.

There was a leak from the Ministry to the _Daily Prophet._ From how Remus understood it, the Black solicitor, Mr. Scrivens, had been working to sue for guardianship on Sirius's behalf, but word spread quickly. An unnamed source confirmed that Sirius had taken Harry from his relatives, and an uproar ensued. Crouch made a statement that if the boy weren't returned immediately, he would call for Sirius's reincarceration, while Mr. Scrivens made his own counterstatement that insisted that Sirius was well within his rights to claim the famous Boy-Who-Lived by the will of James and Lily Potter.

It was a mess, and Remus was unsurprised to find Sirius looking as though he'd been punched in both eyes when he appeared in the Floo.

"It's one in the morning," said Sirius, rubbing his face. "What're you doing up? Thought I would have to yell for you."

Remus, seated on the ottoman, tossed aside his copy of the newspaper. He didn't miss the sway Sirius watched it flutter away. It landed with the accusatory front page staring up at them—a frightful image of Sirius fresh out of Azkaban hanging below the headline.

"Waiting for you," said Remus, smiling tiredly. "Thought you might want to chat. Considering everything. How's Harry?"

"Fine. Better. Curious about the house, but frightened of my mum. Hides every time he hears her shout for Kreacher." Sirius, though appearing quite miserable, brightened for a moment. "I did find a few of the toys I used to play with when I was little, and he really liked them. It's a bit strange to watch, though, him pretending and making up games when the last time I saw him, he was impressed when you'd conjure bubbles in the air and he'd just sort of chase them around. Now though…it's like he's a real person."

Children were a funny thing to Remus who found it difficult not to think of his own childhood. It was bizarre to imagine that he was only a little older than Harry when his life transformed from an ordinary one to another that drained his parents emotionally and financially. At age six, he effectively ruined their lovely, quiet existence. Where Remus had been a burden, however, Harry was a treasure—a treasure that was currently the subject of a newspaper headline.

"I'm glad he's settling in," Remus remarked. "Though I understand it's not entirely your intention to remain there?"

Sirius shifted, glancing down with mild discomfort. "I…hope not. It's just…until I'm officially his guardian and Wormtail is caught…" He swallowed. "I guess… Well, I don't think there's a safer place for us until all of that gets sorted out. I'm not very popular right now, obviously. I'm not just some Death Eater who got off—now I've kidnapped the Boy-Who-Lived. Even when I get Ministry approval to keep Harry, there's still the matter that Wormtail's still out there. Much as I hate it here, Wormtail can't get in. Not to mention, until he's caught, everyone still thinks I'm guilty, so they'll be out for my blood." A sharp, barking laugh escaped from him; it sounded like a dog had been kicked. "I shouldn't have taken him."

Remus knew that. Even Sirius had known when he'd done it that he was making a mistake. If public opinion had been sour about him before, now there would be national outrage, and Remus feared that the Black solicitor might not be able to get Sirius out of trouble.

"What about Dumbledore?" suggested Remus. "Perhaps if we could ask him to speak on your behalf?"

That same laugh startled Remus again.

"Dumbledore?" said Sirius. "You think our dear old headmaster would come to my rescue? When he hadn't a shred of doubt that I'd betrayed James and Lily?"

"Should I remind you that I also believed you were a traitor?"

Sirius didn't respond to that. "What was he like when he came to see you?" he asked instead.

"He isn't happy," said Remus. "And I don't think he's convinced that we haven't been in contact."

"You didn't tell him, did you?"

"No, but you know how he is."

"Are you in trouble?"

"No," said Remus. "Not yet. Now that everyone knows where Harry is, I don't have to lie to him about _that_ particular piece of information. And luckily, I don't think he considers me a traitor for befriending you—just lonely, desperate for company." He smiled ruefully. "I guess it's not hard to believe I'm truly, deplorably desperate."

Pity flashed across Sirius's ruined face. "It's my fault, Moony, I'm sorry—"

"Oh, shut up, there's been enough of that already," said Remus. "I'm tired of all the apologizing. What's done is done, and all we can do is make up for it in the time we've been given. We should be focusing on how we can convince Dumbledore of your innocence."

Sirius's brows shot up as he regarded Remus doubtfully. "Er—that would mean confessing all that we've done. You're all right with that?"

A lump formed in his throat as familiar shame swept over him. The cold feeling of how deeply he had betrayed the headmaster while they were in school raised the hairs on his arms. He had lied to Dumbledore hundreds of times over the years—lied to the one person who worked so hard to allow him to go to school, who accepted him in spite of his condition. And how had he repaid Dumbledore? He'd sheltered the most reviled criminal in the country and denied knowing anything about Harry being taken from his relatives.

Remus had considered over the years how he might tell Dumbledore of their misdeeds, but somewhere along the way, it became just a memory, one that waned in importance as Sirius wasted away in prison. He thought that Sirius was the only one of them left. Since he was locked in Azkaban, what would it matter that he was an Animagus? Sirius would have died and the problem would disappear.

Now that it was clear that Peter still lived, however, the gravity of their actions at school had come back to beleaguer him yet again.

"I don't think he'll be as cross as you think, Moony," said Sirius. "Maybe a bit disappointed, but who doesn't have a few skeletons in their closet, eh? As far as skeletons go, hanging out with a few illegal Animagi when you were sixteen isn't exactly the worst thing anyone's ever done at Hogwarts."

Remus rolled his eyes. "I think it's a bit direr than that."

"It's not like _you're_ an Animagus," Sirius pointed out. "And you didn't help us do it at all. I'm the one likely to be in trouble. The only thing you did was keep your mouth shut so we wouldn't get expelled. Besides, you don't think _Dumbledore_ has a few skeletons in his closet? He's at least a hundred by now. He's got to have done a few bad things in his life. Considering who he was friends with back in his day…"

It was stupid to consider keeping their misdeeds a secret to save himself from the shame of what they'd done, but he felt his face grow hot as he stared at the deepest lines of his hands. He had never killed anyone, not while he was a wolf, yet he'd come close. Could he tell Dumbledore that? He dragged his gaze back up to meet Sirius's.

"I should be the one to tell him," said Remus. "I should be the one who takes the blame."

"Blame for what?" Sirius said. "Having loyal friends?"

"Betraying his trust."

"No, I'll tell him," said Sirius, to Remus's surprise. He shrugged. "It's got to be me. What're you going to do? Just waltz right in and tell him what we did? I know you'd like to have your story and excuses set up, but your part of the story is only a small one—"

Remus snorted.

"—when it comes to what happened to _me_ ," Sirius clarified. "If you want to talk to Dumbledore about it later, fine, but he should hear the rest from me first."

"And what convinces you that he'll grant you an audience?"

"Curiosity," said Sirius. "I'm sure he'll find it intriguing that I want to talk to him. If I were guilty, wouldn't I want to stay far, far away?"

"Not necessarily, not if you thought you could trick him."

"And when has that ever been my strong suit?"

That was true. Remus thought bitterly of the time Sirius convinced Severus Snape to sneak down to the Whomping Willow, almost to his doom, and knew it was only because Snape so desperately wanted to know their secrets that he'd fallen for the trick. And in truth, it wasn't really a trick at all. Sirius told Snape that if he wanted to know what they were up to, all Snape had to do was press the knot at the base of the tree and crawl through the tunnel until he reached the end. Sirius wasn't adept at tricking people—he was more of a reactionary than anything. Dumbledore had been well aware of this in their Order days. Most of Sirius's assignments were simply to throw curses and hexes and try to predict where a future attack would occur while Remus had been thrust into the misery of espionage. Dumbledore was well aware of their natures, particularly Sirius's.

Of course, that still begged the question of how Dumbledore failed to wonder why Sirius had done what he did. Perhaps he thought Sirius had simply switched natures? That Sirius had been trained by Lord Voldemort how to lie?

And not for the first time, Remus shoved aside the nagging thought that perhaps Dumbledore knew far more than he let on.

* * *

A few heads turned to the door of the Hog's Head when Albus Dumbledore entered, but not the barman who was talking to a wan-looking witch whose voice sounded like an electric drill. Dumbledore approached the bar, smiling pleasantly and waited while the barman finished his conversation with the witch. They were talking about a local vampire who was selling his used cadavers to necromancers. Eventually, the barman's eyes flickered to Dumbledore.

"Upstairs," he grunted. "Room 4."

"I assume he was alone?"

"Didn't bring the boy."

Dumbledore had not expected it, especially not since Sirius had suggested the Hog's Head as a meeting place. He nodded at his brother, feeling oddly out-of-sorts. Perhaps he might have wished the two of them a pleasant evening or offered a quip about the unusually warm weather, but he could not manage to form the words. Sirius Black was upstairs waiting for him.

The invitation had come early that morning with an aging, yet handsome owl that Dumbledore had not seen in many years. Over a decade ago, months of that same owl delivering scathing letters and Howlers had tapped on his office window each morning after Sirius Black had first been sorted into Gryffindor House. The demand was the same. Mrs. Black refused to accept that her son would not be joining the other Slytherins in their dormitory, and she insisted her son be re-sorted. It was not the first time (and certainly not the last) that a parent would be upset that their child had not been sorted into the house they desired, but Dumbledore had known no other parent to be so tireless. Not until her second son had come to school did she relent in her daily correspondence.

But the Black family owl had not come with a letter from Walburga Black. The handwriting was far too casual to belong to her and the message too brief. The letter simply read, _Hog's Head, 11 pm, if you want to know everything. – S. B._

Dumbledore had merely stared at the black letters, ones that were hastily etched onto fine stationery. Sirius had not the fine penmanship of his mother and his simplicity was far more intriguing than Walburga Black's tirades. A rare flash of anger pulsed through his fingers.

Sirius had gone to take Harry from Petunia. Dumbledore considered initially that his actions were a message—a jab at the friendship he once shared with James Potter. Was Black gloating that he had tricked James into trusting him? Into making Sirius godfather? Perhaps Sirius thought it amusing, tearing Harry from his relatives like it were an insult to his old friend. With the public eye upon him, Sirius wouldn't dare hurt Harry unless he wanted to receive the Dementor's Kiss, but Dumbledore worried what would happen when Sirius grew bored of the game. What would Sirius do with the boy then? Would the blood protection still hold if Harry were returned to Petunia's care?

As Dumbledore left the pub for the rooms upstairs, he imagined how his conversation with Sirius might go. It was clear that Sirius knew he would be curious. _Of course_ Dumbledore wanted to know everything, yet that strange seed of fury sprouted in his mind as he ascended each stair. What more had Sirius to tell him? Would he attempt to make a bargain with Dumbledore?

The door to Room 4 opened at his gentle push on the handle. Inside, the lamps on the walls were burning, casting a mellow glow on the sole occupant. For a brief moment, Dumbledore caught Sirius off-guard. The boy was slumped in the wooden chair, a knuckle pressed to his brow and his eyes squeezed shut. When the door clicked closed, Sirius sprang from his seat and came to attention.

A handful of years in Azkaban had stolen the ease and grace of the young man Dumbledore had known. Misery and uncertainty now lingered where arrogance had shone from his eyes. Seldom had Dumbledore seen Sirius wear anything other than Muggle clothing since he had left Hogwarts, yet now he wore black robes that might have come from his younger brother's closet. Like a specter, Sirius simply stared at him.

Dumbledore did not smile.

"You wished to see me, Sirius," he said.

Perhaps Sirius could sense the underlying anger Dumbledore suppressed because he stepped back instinctively.

"I figured…I thought I should tell you everything."

"Before you begin," said Dumbledore, "I would prefer if you told me what you intend to do with Harry since you have seen fit to remove him from his home."

Then Sirius's hands clenched into fists. "I'll get to that in a minute."

"If there is something you must tell me, I suggest you inform me what possessed you to take the boy from his family, or I will not hear you."

The fury for which the Blacks were renowned came to life in Sirius's eyes. Perhaps Azkaban had robbed Sirius of his arrogance, but it had left the anger that Dumbledore knew well.

"You—you have _no idea_ what you've done," was all Sirius managed to say. He cleared his throat. "You left him with—with people who don't care about him. They—they—" Sirius seemed to be fighting with himself as if he couldn't words that matched his vehemence. To Dumbledore's surprise, the boy's eyes sparkled with tears. "Did you know?"

"I'm afraid I don't," said Dumbledore.

"You didn't know?"

"Please, enlighten me."

Sirius stared at him. "They—Petunia and her husband—they kept him in a cupboard. That's where he slept. That's where he lived. You—you sent him to live with people who couldn't even give him a bed. And he's…he's so small. They weren't treating him like a child, they treated him like a—a dog, and they kept him in a cupboard like a—like a broom. You didn't know?"

Dumbledore allowed no emotion to cross his face. Impassively, he regarded Sirius.

"You didn't know, did you?" said Sirius, fury melting into a weak plea.

No, he had not known that. He did not consider that Petunia Dursley would perform her guardianship duties in an exemplary manner—in fact, he would have been astounded if she had, yet to suggest that she was capable of treating her nephew like a pesky mongrel was troubling. Petunia Dursley, he'd thought, would not be a doting mother to Harry, but Dumbledore assumed that she would provide his basic needs and perhaps spare Harry the arrogance of his father. James Potter's parents had spoiled him and nearly ruined him to the extent that Dumbledore feared that Harry's fame mingling with James's worst traits might corrupt the boy. He never considered that Petunia would treat him less than human.

"Harry was safe with Petunia," said Dumbledore evenly.

"From what?" snapped Sirius.

Dumbledore did not tell him about the blood protection. Instead, he gestured for Sirius to sit. He conjured another chair for himself and sat, waiting as Sirius silently debated whether he ought to oblige or continue to loom over him.

"What do you intend to do with Harry?" said Dumbledore. "I understand there is a rather tense legal scuffle occurring between your solicitor and the Ministry of Magic regarding Harry's guardianship."

Sirius scoffed. "Raise him, love him, keep him away from people who would neglect him."

"To what end?" prompted Dumbledore.

"To _what end?_ " sputtered Sirius. "To—to make sure he has a good life! What d'you mean _to what end?_ You think I'm going to get tired of him? You think I'm going to just abandon him somewhere? Do you think I'm going to _kill him?_ "

"I did not suggest that—"

"You and everyone else!" he said. The pitch rose his in voice like desperation had entered it. "I asked you to come here today to listen to me, and now you're accusing me of wanting to kill my best friend's son. If you want him back, you'll have to break down the doors at Grimmauld Place. I won't give him up without a fight, _Albus._ He's mine—he's _my_ godson. James made me his guardian, not you and certainly not Petunia. James trusted _me._ "

Dumbledore resisted the temptation to say, _And see what became of James._

"There is no need to be upset, Sirius," placated Dumbledore. There might as well have been steam rising from the young man's shoulders. "I did not come here to demand Harry's return, only that you might consider it."

"Even with what I've said? They keep him locked in a cupboard!"

"That is troubling, indeed," said Dumbledore. "Such an allegation warrants further inquiries, and upon Harry's return to Little Whinging, I would investigate the situation myself, but I would not insist on his return if I did not believe it were the safest place for him."

"Why?"

Dumbledore sighed. "Perhaps you were right. We should not have begun our conversation with Harry."

"But we did," said Sirius. "You brought it up. So let's talk about it. Why did you bring him there in the first place? There's got to be dozens of families better suited to looking after him, ones that are perfectly capable of keeping him safe. I mean, I just walked right up to Number 4 and took him. What if—what if someone else had the same idea?"

Dumbledore had many years of practice to know how to keep his expression completely impassive, but inwardly, he recalled his own astonishment when he learned what Sirius had done. Truly, it should have been impossible if Sirius meant Harry any harm. However, there was something deeper than revenge occurring within Sirius, and Dumbledore had a suspicion that it might have been guilt.

Perhaps Sirius held contrition for what he had done to James. It might not have been a cruel jab at all, stealing Harry away. What if it were only a misguided attempt to assuage the guilt in his heart, to raise the son of the man he betrayed? Sirius might truly have cared for Harry, after all.

It did not change, however, the existence of the blood protection on Privet Drive, and no matter how much Sirius wished the boy well, Harry would never be safe anywhere other than his Aunt Petunia's home.

"This appointment is limited," Dumbledore informed him. "I do not wish to continue speaking of Harry unless you intend to return him. Otherwise, I advise you to tell me what it is you felt warranted an audience with me."

"But—" Sirius swallowed, glancing at the door. Then he drew a sigh and retreated to the chair where he sat. He looked like a child, not the man who had spent the last few years in Azkaban. Dumbledore was struck by how much he looked like the sixteen-year-old who had once sat before him in his office and hung his head with shame.

"What is it, Sirius? What do you wish for me to know?"

Sirius stared at his hands. "I don't know where to start. I guess… I should tell you from the beginning…"

"I find that is usually the best place," said Dumbledore, softly smiling. Deep, silent breathing kept his heart from thudding. He had no desire to hear Sirius's spin on events, but long ago, he had learned that every point of view was vital in the fight against Lord Voldemort. There could be no shred of information too unimportant for him to know. How Tom Riddle could take a man like Sirius who was so staunchly opposed to pureblood fanaticism and transform him into a person who could so cruelly betray his best friend, Dumbledore was hungry to know.

"James first came to me after you suggested they hide under the protection of the Fidelius Charm," said Sirius. "You'll remember, it was just after the cottage in Dorset was destroyed. James explained how it worked, and he wanted me to be Secret Keeper. I told him I would do it."

"Yes, I remember," said Dumbledore. This, however, could not be the beginning Sirius mentioned…

"But I thought about it," Sirius went on. "The trouble was, though, everyone knew what I meant to James. Everyone knew we were best friends. If Voldemort suspected James and Lily had used the Fidelius Charm, he'd know immediately that it was me who was Secret Keeper. So I thought about it a bit more, and I wondered maybe it would be a better idea if we picked someone else. What if we made Voldemort only believe that I was the Secret Keeper? After all, it's not a foolproof charm, is it? I was already sure to be a target, so I figured, they could go after me and I'd lead them on a chase, drawing them away from the real Secret Keeper. Once I was caught, they could torture me as long as they liked. If Voldemort killed me, he would assume the secret died with me. I thought it was clever and I convinced James to pick someone else—someone we never thought Voldemort would suspect the Potters would choose…"

Then a strange, deranged sort of smile drew the corners of Sirius's lips back. His eyes were watery and his cheeks were pale as he smiled at Dumbledore.

Dumbledore did not move, nor did he blink. He only said, "Go on."

Sirius's smile faded slightly. "Do you remember, professor, that night when I almost—when Remus nearly—when Snape was almost killed? You told me that my cleverness would someday have—how did you put it—dire consequences? You suggested that I might have a habit of putting my friends in jeopardy by trying to protect them. Well, it seems that you were right. I told James that he should use Peter as Secret Keeper, but the thing is, professor, we didn't know, he was a spy for Voldemort."

Dumbledore allowed himself no expression. "That is quite an accusation, Sirius. Does that mean you claim that you are innocent of the crimes that put you in Azkaban?"

"Yes," said Sirius. Then he rose, agitated suddenly. "Listen, I know how it sounds."

"How do you suppose it sounds?"

"It sounds like I'm just trying to get you on my side," he said. "Like I just need you to believe me long enough so I can get custody of Harry. This…this was stupid. I don't have proof, I've hardly got any sort of credibility—none, really. I don't know why I've bothered. Look at you—you don't believe me, do you?"

"I have not heard your story, Sirius," said Dumbledore. "How could I pass judgment on a tale you have not told me?"

"Why would you believe me? It sounds like I'm just some madman trying to get his name back. If it weren't for Harry, I don't know how much I'd care about me, but he's in danger. The thing is, Peter's still out there. He's alive, professor, and I can't be the only one who knows. If I lose this guardianship battle, then they might bring me back to Azkaban, and Harry will be even worse trouble."

The dark circles beneath Sirius's eyes suggested that sleep had not been a friend to him for the last few nights. Words spilled from his mouth like a torrent of thoughts, none of which seemed to be properly cataloged. Like most of Sirius Black's actions, this meeting had not come with an agenda, and Dumbledore knew that whatever Sirius was trying to tell him, it must have been the truth as Sirius knew it.

Dumbledore let his eyes soften. "Tell me the story that convinced Remus Lupin of your innocence, Sirius."

"What d'you mean?" said Sirius, frowning.

"I know you visited him, and he did not refuse you."

"He believed me when I told him it was Peter," Sirius murmured. "Mostly because…well, I asked him if it was easier to believe that Peter was capable of it all or me."

"Ah," said Dumbledore. "Yes, that is a perplexing question. Presented only with the events that occurred on the last day of October and the earliest hours of the first of November of 1981, I would undoubtedly presume it was you who betrayed James and his family to Lord Voldemort. However, I have never considered the possibility the actions belonged to another. The trouble is, Sirius, I wonder how Peter might have survived the blast in which we assumed he perished. I do not believe Apparition was detected on the scene. Peter would have been seen if he had survived. Alas, only a finger was recovered."

"He's an Animagus," said Sirius. Then Sirius grimaced. "I know what that sounds like, professor—"

"I would ask that for the rest of this conversation, you might refrain from suggesting how I interpret your story," Dumbledore chastised, hiding his surprise at the revelation.

"But it sounds ludicrous, doesn't it?"

"I am certain there must be an explanation. Am I correct to presume that he was not the only Animagus in your group? I would not like to restrain Mr. Pettigrew's achievements, but I suspect he might not have managed such a feat without guidance or inspiration from his friends."

Sirius pressed a knuckle to his brow. "Please don't be angry, professor. And—and Remus had nothing to do with it, I swear. I mean, it was to keep him company during his transformations, but we didn't give him a choice. James and Peter and I—we became Animagi. It was fifth year that we finally managed it. Peter became a rat, James a stag, and I a dog."

That surprised Dumbledore.

Hogwarts was a part of Dumbledore as much as Dumbledore had become a part of the castle. It wasn't only the portraits that reported back to Dumbledore the goings-on of students, nor was it only Professor McGonagall and her briefings as Deputy Headmistress. There was something that connected Dumbledore to the walls and staircases and the flagstones—sometimes he could sense when danger was afoot, sometimes he even knew when students were out of bed. He knew he had impressed many a student by knowing exactly who was about to knock on his door by calling them in before they could raise a knuckle.

Yet sometimes, the castle knew better than he. Sometimes, the school kept hidden what it would not like Dumbledore to know. Sirius and his friends becoming Animagi must have been something that the castle found crucial to keep secret.

"Perhaps you could tell me what happened the night James and Lily died," said Dumbledore.

The story that followed revealed what Dumbledore had long suspected—that Sirius was a young man blinded by his own arrogance and cleverness. It had never seemed quite in-character that Sirius would play a long game of espionage in the name of Lord Voldemort. Ever impulsive, Sirius would sooner show his cards the moment he had been dealt them than wait for the appropriate moment. The boy had no patience for stealth. In Dumbledore's own experience, he learned quickly that reconnaissance was no task for the headstrong Black heir, and he would be better suited as a projectile than a spy.

Peter Pettigrew's true nature was no surprise either.

To the question of which man was more suited to espionage, the answer was obvious. Peter was unassuming. He was forgettable, and he yearned for importance without putting his life in peril.

By the end of the tale, Sirius was recounting his experience with numbness, his voice fading into monotone as he returned to his seat, his shoulders drooping with suppressed emotion. When his words faded and the room grew silent, Dumbledore laced his fingers together in his lap and regarded him.

"Do you know where Peter is now?"

Sirius shook his head. "Could be anywhere. But I think he's close, or he'll try to be close. I'm afraid he'll try to go after Harry."

"Sirius, do you know why the Killing Curse failed when Voldemort turned it upon Harry, though only moments earlier, he had succeeded in killing James and Lily?"

Sirius shook his head again.

"There are forces in this world stronger than hate, stronger than Voldemort's power," said Dumbledore. "I have said it many times before, but those who crave power often overlook the strength of love. You see, when Voldemort went to Godric's Hollow, he offered Lily a choice—to live and give up her son, or perish. When Lily refused to give up her son and accepted her death, her final act of love prevented Voldemort's success in casting the Killing Curse. In her final moments, she constructed a protection that forced the curse to rebound. That protection remains to this day, its existence dependent on a connection to Lily's blood."

Sirius stared, mouth open slightly. "Petunia," he supplied.

"Precisely," said Dumbledore. "I left Harry with Petunia, a blood relative of his mother, and when Petunia accepted him, it secured the protections I placed upon her home. While he still calls Privet Drive home, the blood protection remains. Can you see why I insist that you return him, Sirius?"

"Oh," said Sirius, frowning. "But Harry won't live there forever. He'll leave eventually. He won't be protected his entire life, at least until he moves out or Petunia dies."

"The protection will expire when he becomes of age."

"But if Voldemort is dead, does it matter?"

"He is not dead," said Dumbledore. "I have reason to believe that, though severely weakened, Lord Voldemort is not truly gone. I fear there is still another war yet to come."

"So you'll keep Harry in a home where he's neglected because you think Voldemort is going to come back someday," Sirius said. "You've decided it's better that he remain unloved in a home where he sleeps in a cupboard than with me, is that it?"

"Yes."

Perhaps Sirius had not suspected the answer so bluntly. Sirius stood suddenly and turned away, his fists clenched again at his sides. It was taking every ounce of his resolve not to shout, Dumbledore could see that.

"Well, that's not your decision," Sirius told him. "It's mine. I told you earlier, James made me his guardian."

"You have not proven to be a thoughtful or considerate guardian, Sirius. I fear that your rashness will cost Harry. I believe it already has."

Sirius spun. "I took him away from a bad situation! I think that's rather _considerate_ of me, _Albus_."

"Yet your actions have suggested you are incapable of behaving rationally," snapped Dumbledore, his own resolve fading quickly. "I do not believe you intentionally led James to his death, but you have not behaved like a man who has a child to raise. Perhaps if you had not chased Pettigrew, you might have been awarded guardianship. It is clear that you would put your own agenda before the needs of the child you promised James to protect. Considering your actions, do you believe James, would choose you again as Harry's godfather? Do you suppose James would approve of what you've done?"

"I'm a human being, Dumbledore, not some goddamned saint like you," spat Sirius. "I make mistakes. Human beings make mistakes. We atone for them. We admit that we made them and try to learn from them. But you—no, you can't even admit that you made a mistake. You'd send Harry back to a place where he's malnourished and neglected because you thought he'd be safe there. Well, he's not. He's miserable, he's scared, and I'd rather go back to Azkaban than let you take him back. I'd sooner let the Malfoys raise him than return him to Petunia and her husband."

Dumbledore said nothing as Sirius shook his head again. The young man, his fatigue and misery so obvious in his hollow gaze, stuffed a hand in his pocket for his wand. The meeting was over, that was clear.

Before Sirius Apparated, however, his lip curled with disdain.

"You never cared about James and Lily. All Harry means to you is a prophecy—a sacrifice to the greater good. I don't know why I thought you'd help me."

Then Sirius Black was gone, leaving Dumbledore to stare at the spot where he'd stood, and Dumbledore wished with every fiber of his being that Sirius could have been right. It would have all been so much easier if he did not care about Harry's happiness. Harry should have been nothing more than a tool to use against Tom Riddle, but no matter how Dumbledore tried to reduce Harry to a queen on the chessboard, he could only loathe himself for what he knew he must do to Harry to save their world.

* * *

A/N: Thanks again for all of the reviews + follows! I apologize for the delay in getting this chapter out. My personal life has gotten a bit messy and my mental health is not great (like everyone else's right now) which is making it difficult to sit down and write. But spring is just around the corner here in the Midwest, so hopefully, it'll help me get back into the writing groove. Anyway, thanks for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> It's another one of those stories - one where Walburga frees Sirius and they are forced to reconcile somehow. I love this type of story, honestly, and I wanted to write one so badly. I feel a bit self-conscious writing something that writers far more skilled than I have already written, but it's been therapeutic working on this and I hope it's an enjoyable addition to this well-worn trope. Additionally, there won't be any romance - despite Mrs. Black's insistence - as I want to focus on family relationships. 
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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